Cybersecurity patents are way up in the SQ

The number of cybersecurity patent applications per year shows that the amount of investment, research, and development going into finding new ways to help prevent cyber attacks is huge. Since the turn of the millennium, there have been 2,269 applications filed to date that relate to cybersecurity. Applications have accelerated over the last 10 years, which can be linked to a rapid growth in innovation. In the early 2000s, crime organizations started to heavily fund professional cyber attacks, and governments clamped down, holding hackers accountable with criminal penalties and serious sentences. However, cyber attacks continued to rise, and the 2010s saw many high-profile breaches and attacks impact national security across the globe, costing businesses millions. This could explain the jump in cybersecurity patent applications during this period, as inventors worked to find new and innovative ways to prevent attacks. In 2020, filings peaked with a total of 453 applications received by patent offices around the world. That number dropped in 2021, indicating that cybersecurity advancements slowed down because of the global pandemic’s impact and the disruption caused to the economy. What’s clear from the data is that the last few years have seen a huge spike in innovation. The widespread adoption of mobile and cloud applications, as well as the use of artificial intelligence (AI), introduces new vulnerabilities that call for a different approach, and therefore new security solutions.