A new white paper from maritime cyber security company CYTUR warns that the “era of disconnected seas is over.”
The report ‘2026 Maritime Cyber Threat White Paper’ shows that the number of maritime cyber incidents in 2025 has surged by 103%, compared to 2024. Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS), ransomware, and malware infections account for the majority of these attacks, with their growth rate more than doubling over the past year.
As witnessed in the 2025 satellite infrastructure sabotage, a single breach can now expose national strategic assets and paralyze global supply chains.
In conflict-prone areas such as the Strait of Hormuz and the Baltic Sea, system disruption activities – including GPS manipulation and electronic jamming – are prevalent, often orchestrated to achieve state-level military or political objectives.
Recently, there has been a frequent discovery of GPS spoofing tactics used against oil tankers.
In contrast, Asian waters and global hub ports with high shipping volumes frequently see data breaches and ransomware attacks by criminal organizations seeking to maximize financial gain.
The paper details an October 2025 ransomware attack on a manufacturer of maritime electronic equipment, which led to the suspension of equipment maintenance, emergency software updates, and the supply of new parts, creating a safety vacuum for global fleets.
In December 2025, a major terminal operator, fell victim to a ransomware attack. In the first half of 2025, a port in Europe also faced an intensive cyberattack by nation-state-sponsored hacker groups.
In 2026, regulatory compliance will become a critical risk factor determining the survival of maritime enterprises. As stringent requirements like IACS UR E26/27 become fully operational, vessels or equipment manufacturers failing to meet security certifications will face real operational risks, including loss of sailing credentials or denial of port entry.
Furthermore, as “shadow fleets” remain blind spots for security vulnerabilities, international pressure and cyber sanctions to block these entities will intensify.
Cybersecurity is no longer just a checkbox on a design blueprint; it has become a fundamental “License to Sail” that determines whether a ship can be delivered and operated.
Crucially, the white paper warns 2026 will see more autonomous attacks, where AI evolves beyond a supportive tool to independently execute operations. AI agents can now perform up to 90% of the attack lifecycle – from vulnerability analysis to data exfiltration – without human intervention. This lowers the barrier to entry, enabling low-skilled threat actors to launch nation-state-level sophisticated attacks at scale, leading to an explosive increase in attack frequency against maritime organizations.
Instead of targeting individual vessels, attackers will focus on “choke points” in the supply chain, such as telecommunication providers and OEM equipment manufacturers. The tactic of paralyzing an entire fleet by infiltrating a single satellite provider will become commonplace.
“Cyber-Physical Attacks,” where digital breaches lead to physical destruction, will become increasingly sophisticated. GPS jamming and spoofing in conflict zones will become a daily reality.
The “cartelization” of politically motivated hacktivists and profit-driven ransomware organizations will deepen.
To survive in this new era where AI-driven attacks and supply chain vulnerabilities are the norm, CYTUR says the maritime industry must embrace three core transformations. The first is to move beyond generic CTI to Maritime Cyber Threat Intelligence (MCTI). The second is to implement a Cyber Security Management System (CSMS) that applies threat modeling from the initial design phase, ensuring compliance with international regulations (IACS UR E26/E27) is embedded into the vessel’s DNA.
CYTUR also suggests to shift our focus to Resilience – the ability to anticipate, withstand, and rapidly recover from attacks. Shipyards, shipping lines, and equipment manufacturers must form a collaborative governance ecosystem, sharing Software Bill of Materials (SBOMs) and incident data to ensure business continuity under any circumstance.
