Artificial intelligence is a term that many science fiction fans are well aware of. However, in recent years, it has gone from fiction pages into reality, as more and more developers are leveraging software’s ability to teach itself. New languages and techniques have sprouted up to help machines teach themselves the best way to do things. While this has made for faster development cycles in some industries, it has been met with alarm in other quarters. Cybersecurity, for example, relies on staying ahead of threats and predicting the steps of malicious users. Depending on your perspective, AI can have either a negative or a positive impact on cybersecurity. But which one weighs heavier on the industry?
The Changing Face of Cybersecurity
We are currently at a crossroads in the development and evolution of cybersecurity software. Tech Radar mentions that the comparison of cybersecurity as an arms race against malicious users holds true in the modern age to a great extent. Staying ahead of threats is the only way that professionals can guarantee that their enterprise systems remain safe. However, it has become increasingly difficult to do so. While there is a much more efficient distribution method for cybersecurity experts with the modern internet, malicious users have the same ease of use in disseminating threat information. It’s often compared to a fisherman plugging holes in a boat before the water comes in enough to sink it. There are always more holes to fill.
AI has thrown cybersecurity developers a lifeline by giving them a series of tools that they can use to help them shore up their defenses. CIO Story mentions that up to 90% of cybersecurity professionals in the US and Japan rely on AI to develop approaches for dealing with malicious threats to their networks. Teaching AI what to look for in-network traffic or learning for itself what it should be seeing can shift the advantage to the cybersecurity experts.
Using AI in Modern Cybersecurity Applications
Artificial intelligence has already been leveraged to provide some level of security to businesses. Logins, for example, are among the most common exploit that malicious users will leverage in cases of cyber-attack. Fingerprint logins and other biometric data is a much more secure method of logging into enterprise systems. AI facilitates this increased security by performing real-time verification of the fingerprint scans, ensuring that the user is who they claim to be.
AI also has an advantage over human investigators when dealing with the influx of malware and viruses. AV-Test Institute mentions that daily, there are over 350,000 new cases of malware generated. Human researchers would have a hard time matching signatures with these new variants, but if an AI is adequately trained, it can do this quickly and efficiently.
Machine Learning gives AI an edge when it comes to detecting malicious patterns of network traffic as well. Hackers usually spoof legitimate network traffic as they make their way around an enterprise system, but they leave traces behind. Skilled cybersecurity professionals can spot these traces and discover their system has been compromised. However, AI can also pick up on abnormal network usage and potentially locate hackers faster than a human agent. There’s always the chance of a false positive coming up, but having human researchers as a failsafe can filter the results.
AI Isn’t Just For Security
The technology that cybersecurity firms have aren’t limited to their use. Malicious users have access to the very same tech. Brute-force attacks and searching for entry points are challenging and time-consuming for hackers. As more systems utilize white-hat security experts to test their defenses, these are becoming even harder to find. However, with a well-trained AI knowing what to look for, it can locate vulnerability points within an enterprise network and give malicious users easy entry into the system. AI can be a blessing or a curse to modern cybersecurity applications. Using AI to figure out these flaws in the network can direct professionals to shore up their defenses.
Limitations Are Still Present
Even with all the benefits that AI offers to cybersecurity, it’s far from a single solution to the problem. AI technology has a long way to go, and there are severe limitations on what is possible with AI, thanks to the current level of hardware. AI systems are only as good as their training and data sets. The chances are that they will continue to evolve and become better with time. Eventually, we may see an AI-only cybersecurity suite that can deal with malicious users directly. Today’s AIs still rely heavily on professionals for them to get their work done.
As companies start to adopt AI-based cybersecurity, hackers will take note. Their profile of a company may change based on the level of AI it incorporates into its systems. For now, we don’t know whether AI will prove to be a blessing or a curse for cybersecurity. We are likely to see continued integration of AI and human-based cybersecurity, with AI systems slowly being more dominant if they seem to provide better defense against intrusion.