[from the December issue of Smart Tech Investor]

The sharp increase in the number of large-scale data breaches in 2014 will result in a boost in spending on cyber-attack detection, prevention and mitigation for the year ahead.

In the first half of 2014, there were a total of 559 breaches worldwide, resulting in 375 million customer records being stolen or lost, according to SafeNet. In Q3, the number of breaches totaled 320, up almost 25% from the year-ago period. In the latest quarter, 183 million customer records were either stolen or lost, with the most number of compromised accounts evident across the financial services and retail industries.

It is becoming increasingly apparent with each major breach that enterprise budgets for IT security are way too low. Many organizations these days have such limited security functionality on their networks that they don’t even know when they’ve been breached; it often takes months and months for companies to figure out that accounts and/or records have been compromised.

For 2015, purchase orders will flow to the security vendors with the best next-generation technology for monitoring and securing data, as well as to those capable of fully cleaning up after a breach.

FireEye (FEYE), provider of a virtual machine-based platform providing real-time protection to enterprises and governments against next-generation cyber-attacks, is one standout in this sector, offering a complete portfolio of solutions, even down to the endpoint. FireEye is a ‘Buy’ in the Next Wave Portfolio up to $33.