Today marks the launch of the 2026 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report (DBIR), one of the cybersecurity industry’s most trusted and enduring reports.
For the fourth consecutive year, Censys is proud to contribute Internet Intelligence to help power the DBIR.
That milestone matters to us because the DBIR has become an industry standard for one simple reason: it is built on rigor, collaboration, and trusted data. Security leaders, researchers, practitioners, and executives around the world rely on the report to better understand how breaches happen, how attackers evolve, and where organizations must adapt to stay ahead.
The quality of the report depends on the quality of its contributors. We’re honored that Verizon continues to trust Censys Internet Intelligence as part of this important work.
The Threat Landscape Is Accelerating
This year’s DBIR reinforces what security teams are already experiencing firsthand: attackers are moving faster than ever.
As the report notes:
“There are more zero days and critical vulnerabilities year over year (YoY), generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) augmented malware is now a common occurrence, and complex forms of social engineering are becoming more successful as the prelude to a breach.”
AI is accelerating the scale, speed, and adaptability of modern threats. Adversaries can rapidly generate malware variants, automate reconnaissance, and continuously shift infrastructure to evade detection. That changes the requirements for defenders:
Internal telemetry alone is no longer sufficient.
Over the past decade, organizations invested heavily in strengthening internal security controls, EDRs, firewalls, SIEMs, identity access management systems, and broader visibility across frameworks like MITRE ATT&CK. Those investments have absolutely improved security outcomes.
But today’s threat landscape requires something more: visibility beyond the enterprise perimeter and across the Internet itself.
As the DBIR highlights, Internet-facing vulnerabilities have become a primary entry point for attackers, making external visibility and exposure prioritization increasingly critical for defenders.
Security teams increasingly need to answer questions like:
- Can I understand the DNS and Internet relationships behind malicious operations?
- Can I track adversaries as they continuously shift infrastructure?
- Can I identify infrastructure that could become an attack path?
- Can I see everything I own and expose to the Internet?
In an AI-driven threat landscape, Internet intelligence is no longer optional infrastructure for defenders, it is foundational.
Built to Understand the Internet
Censys was founded to make the Internet a safer place.
Since day one, we have pushed the boundaries of what’s possible in Internet visibility, from pioneering fast Internet-wide scanning to building one of the world’s most sophisticated Internet intelligence platforms. Our mission has always been to help organizations better understand their exposure, their attack surface, and the infrastructure adversaries rely on.
This is exactly why Censys exists.
And it’s why we continue to expand how organizations operationalize Internet intelligence. This year, we launched the Censys ARC research team to track adversary infrastructure globally, expanded our DNS intelligence capabilities to expose relationships behind malicious infrastructure, and introduced Censys Adversary Intelligence to help defenders investigate and track threat actor operations with greater speed and precision.
We believe improving cybersecurity requires collaboration across the industry, with researchers, defenders, intelligence teams, and technology partners all working together to better understand the evolving Internet threat landscape.
The Verizon DBIR represents the very best of that collaboration. It’s why 10 of the top 10 global cybersecurity product companies, 10 of the 10 cyber threat intelligence companies, and 9 of the top 10 MSSPs rely on Censys to power their missions.
When the industry’s leading organizations need to understand the Internet and adversarial infrastructure – they turn to the same Internet intelligence that powers the DBIR.
The Intelligence behind the Intelligence
We’re proud to contribute to the 2026 Verizon DBIR and to support the broader cybersecurity community with the intelligence needed to better understand modern threats.
Most importantly, we’re excited to continue working alongside defenders, researchers, and partners across the industry to help make the Internet a safer place.
Learn more
- Read the latest intelligence from Censys ARC
- Understand how to operationalize Censys in your environment.
