Australia's ASD annual threat report: 1,500+ incidents (up 20%), 82,000 cybercrime reports, notifications up almost 80%, and AI called "the defining force" of the year
The Australian Signals Directorate's ACSC published its seventh Annual Cyber Threat Report, covering the 2025-26 financial year.
- Numbers: more than 1,500 incidents responded to (up over 20% on 2024-25); more than 82,000 cybercrime reports (about one every six minutes); more than 4,400 notifications to Australian organizations about possible malicious activity (up almost 80%), including mass notifications to over 2,100 entities; more than 37,500 hotline calls.
- AI: the foreword says AI let attackers "find vulnerabilities faster and exploit them at unprecedented scale, speed and sophistication", and that "in recent weeks, new threats have emerged from the unintended actions of AI agents and model testing."
- It also says the line between state-sponsored espionage, sabotage and cybercrime is blurring, and repeats the basics: MFA or passkeys, patching, and reporting incidents to cyber.gov.au.
Separate factsheets cover individuals, businesses and critical infrastructure.
Sources: ASD: Australian Signals Directorate releases seventh annual Cyber Threat Report 2025-26 (Oct 27) · ACSC: Annual Cyber Threat Report 2025-26 (publication page and PDF) · Minister for Defence: media release on the 2025-26 report (Oct 26)