Accenture and Microsoft expand AI-powered cybersecurity collaboration

Accenture (NYSE: ACN) and Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) announced they are co-investing in the development of generative AI-driven cybersecurity solutions to help organizations mitigate threats and consolidate technology tools while optimizing operational costs.

The collaboration focuses on four key areas: security operation center modernization, automated data and AI security, security-centric cyber migration and consolidation, and enhanced identity and access management. According to Accenture's State of Cyber Resilience 2025 report, 90% of organizations are not ready to protect against AI-augmented cyber threats.

The companies completed a project with Nationwide Building Society, which has over 17 million customers in the UK. Through a migration to Microsoft Sentinel, Nationwide achieved a streamlined security infrastructure that accelerates cyber threat detection. The project utilized a generative AI security information and event management capability that accelerated the migration of hundreds of terabytes of data.

"The use of generative AI to enable the migration allowed us to deliver the change more efficiently, in turn freeing up capacity for wider improvement activities," said David Boda, chief security and resilience officer at Nationwide.

The solutions being developed include SOC modernization using Microsoft Sentinel and Microsoft Defender, which the companies claim can boost SOC efficiency by up to 30%. The security-centric migration and consolidation solution leverages Microsoft's security suite and claims to achieve between 35% to 50% cost savings. Enhanced identity and access management solutions using Microsoft Entra Suite claim to deliver between 30% to 50% cost efficiencies.

The automated data protection solution uses Microsoft Purview and Accenture's data security framework to classify and protect sensitive data across Microsoft 365 platforms including SharePoint, Teams and Exchange.

Information in this article is based on a press release statement from the companies.

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