The study, Security industry's dirty little secret, which was conducted by technology market research firm Vanson Bourne examines the controversy and confusion surrounding AETs and the role they play in Advanced Persistent Threats (APTs).
AETs is a network attack that combines different known evasion methods to create a new technique that is delivered over several layers of the network simultaneously and provides the attacker with undetectable access to the network.
It added that some of the recent high profile data breaches have demonstrated that criminal activity can still evade detection for a long period.
The study covered 800 CIOs (Chief Information Officers) and security managers from the US, the UK, Germany, France, Australia, Brazil and South Africa.
It showed that misunderstandings, misinterpretation and ineffective safeguards in use by security experts charged with protecting sensitive data.
"Survey respondents acknowledged this and more than one in five security professionals admit their network was breached (22 per cent). Nearly 40 per cent of those breached believe that AETs played a key role," the study said.
Almost two-thirds of respondents said the biggest challenge, when trying to implement technology against AETs, is convincing the board that they are a real and serious threat, it said.
Of the estimated 800 million known AETs, less than one per cent is detected by other vendor's firewalls. The prevalence of these techniques has risen significantly since 2010 with millions of combinations and modifications of network-based AETs having been identified to date, McAfee said.