Proofpoint Report: Singapore Organisations Struggle with Data Security as Gen AI Adoption, Data Sprawl Intensify Insider Risks

Proofpoint, Inc., a leading cybersecurity and compliance company, has released its second annual Data Security Landscape report, revealing that Singaporean organisations continue to face widespread data loss as they struggle to protect sensitive information amid explosive data growth, Artificial Intelligence (AI) adoption, and the emergence of AI agents in the workplace.

The report, based on insights from 1,000 security professionals across 10 countries, including Singapore, combined withProofpoint platform data, highlights the rapid adoption of AI-driven productivity tools and autonomous agents that handle sensitive data is compounding risk for Singapore’s enterprises. Many lack the visibility and controls to govern this emerging “agentic workspace,” where humans and AI systems now work side by side. Meanwhile, surging data volumes are putting even greater strain on already stretched security teams.

“We’ve entered a new era of data security where insider threats, relentless data growth, and AI-driven change are testing the limits of traditional defences,” said Ryan Kalember, Chief Strategy Officer at Proofpoint. “Fragmented tools and limited visibility leave organisations exposed. The future of data protection depends on unified, AI-powered solutions that understand content and context, adapt in real time, and secure information across both human and agent activity.”

What Proofpoint Found in Singapore

Key findings in Singapore include:

• People continue to drive most data loss incidents in Singapore: 45% of organisations attribute their most significant data loss events to careless employees or third-party contractors, while 38% cite compromised users and 36% point to malicious insiders.

• Proofpoint telemetry underscores an imbalance: Just 1% of users are responsible for 76% of data loss events, emphasising the importance of behaviour-aware, adaptive security strategies. Data loss frequency also remains alarmingly high: respondents in Singapore reported an average of 10 incidents per year, with some organisations experiencing multiple incidents each month. These incidents can take weeks to resolve, leaving sensitive information exposed and security teams overburdened.

• Data growth and sprawl exacerbate the challenge: Enterprise data volumes are soaring, stretching visibility and control to the limit. More than one-fifth (21%) of organisations in Singapore saw their data grow 30% or more over the past year. Among global enterprises with over 10,000 employees, 41% manage more than a petabyte of data. This unchecked expansion carries serious implications: 42% cite cloud and SaaS data sprawl as a top challenge, and 35% say redundant or obsolete data poses significant risk. Proofpoint platform data reinforces this, showing that 27% of cloud storage is abandoned—unused data that inflates costs and widens the attack surface.

• The rise of the agentic workspace and new data risks: As organisations rapidly deploy AI across enterprise workflows, it is emerging as a new class of insider risk rivalling human error. Two in five (40%) organisations in Singapore cite data loss via public or enterprise GenAI tools as a top concern, while 39% worry about sensitive data being used in AI training. AI agents—often operating as highly privileged superusers—introduce further risk, with more than one-third (35%) of organisations flagging unsupervised data access by agents as a critical threat. Oversight gaps amplify these risks: almost half (49%) of Singaporean organisations lack sufficient visibility and controls over GenAI tools.

• Security teams are under strain amid fragmented toolsets: Fragmented security architectures continue to hinder visibility, response and remediation efforts. More than one-fifth (21%) of Singaporean organisations report that resolving a data loss incident can take between one and four weeks. With 59% relying on six or more data security vendors, the resulting tool sprawl increases complexity and drains already overextended security teams.

• A call for unified, AI-driven data security programs: Security leaders are increasingly looking to holistic data security and insider risk solutions to reduce security risk and simplify operations. Almost three out of five (59%) Singaporean organisations have already deployed AI-enhanced data security capabilities to classify data. 58% of respondents see the greatest benefit of a unified data security solution as enabling the safe and productive use of AI, while 51% believe it will reduce data loss risk.