LOTS OF VENDOR HELP WITH DEFENSE. Organizations also rely on third-party vendors to augment their defense strategies. The security ecosystem provides them with ways to share the responsibility for security. Seventy-two percent of the security professionals said they rely on third-party vendors for 20 to 80 percent of their security. Those organizations that rely heavily on outside help for security were most likely to say that they will increase their use of third-party vendors in the future.

Gersh, of Forthright Technology Partners, says businesses can use an outside party such as a security services provider to offer a fresh, independent perspective on organizational vulnerabilities. "There's a certain kind of blindness when you're working in a [particular] environment" all the time, he said.