The next phase of the cyber war is here, and it's powered by AI.

A new report from CrowdStrike Holdings Inc (NASDAQ:CRWD) shows that cybercriminals are moving quicker, hitting harder, and now leveraging artificial intelligence as a means of scaling attacks. The effect of this, however, is quietly altering the investment thesis for cybersecurity ETFs.

AI Is Speeding Up The Battlefield

The “2026 Global Threat Report” by CrowdStrike shows that the breakout time, the time between the initial breach of an enterprise network and the lateral movement of the attacker inside a network, was a only 27 seconds.

Meanwhile, AI-powered attacks accelerated by 89%, while zero-day exploits, attacks that occur before the software vendor has publicly acknowledged the threat, were up 42%.

This shift is forcing enterprises and governments to rethink spending priorities—potentially creating a sustained tailwind for cybersecurity firms.

Cloud And AI Become Prime Targets

The report also points out that there has been a 266% increase in cloud-focused intrusions by state actors, thereby emphasizing the importance of cloud security.

Companies like Zscaler Inc (NASDAQ:ZS) and Palo Alto Networks Inc (NASDAQ:PANW) are well positioned to reap the benefits of this growing trend, owing to their subscription-based business models with AI-driven platforms that create long-term revenue streams—a perfect combination for ETF issuers to keep an eye on.

ETFs Are Leaning Into The Trend

Cybersecurity-focused ETFs hold a small group of high-growth companies, thereby becoming more sensitive to this growing trend.

The First Trust NASDAQ Cybersecurity ETF (NASDAQ:CIBR) and Amplify Cybersecurity ETF (NYSE:HACK) both give significant weightage to large-cap leaders such as CrowdStrike and Palo Alto Networks, while the Global X Cybersecurity ETF
(NASDAQ:BUG) is more concentrated on pure plays.

As AI continues to change the dynamics of both offense and defense, cybersecurity is moving away from being a back-office function of IT to becoming a strategic focus.

For ETFs tracking the space, that shift could translate into sustained inflows—and potentially meaningful market attention.

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