Cyber Leadership Foresight #1
Issues & trends impacting cyber leaders and the cyber ecosystem
Welcome to the flagship issue of my weekly digest written for cybersecurity leaders and those concerned with the future of cyber leadership and the cyber ecosystem. Each week you will find a shortlist of curated content on specific trends, issues, or challenges facing cyber leaders and their companies.
Artificial Intelligence & Automation
The benefits of AI and automation are promising and continue to get a lot of attention.
Careful, though, AI brings with it some risk. It is emerging as a two-headed dragon with many ethical and pragmatic questions and concerns. As many realize, it is complicated because AI continues to be deployed widely in business; a trend will only increase. As a result, the impact on cybersecurity organizations is still being understood.
On the other hand, automation is the eager new-kid-on-the-block, full of promise and excitement. Within the cyber domain, opportunities abound for small and significant improvements in efficiency, quality, and accuracy. The rise of the pandemic protocols has only fueled the movement towards more automation. But the elephant in the room is how cyber automation will impact the largely skills-based workforce. Many worries that this trend merely replaces costly human labor that does not add much additional value.
Artificial Intelligence and Cybersecurity: A Double-Edged Sword
Like other technologies, AI provides excellent potential for corporations and companies and entails risks detrimental to humanity’s existence.
A different set of threats may arise if a person or an organization intentionally tries to exploit AI systems to their advantage as if they were a weapon in a crime.
Artificial Intelligence in Cybersecurity Operations
The attack surface is rapidly expanding and evolving at an unprecedented pace. Not surprisingly, cyberattacks are becoming more sophisticated and are increasing at lightning speed. There are innumerable and varying cyber threats that need to be detected, prevented and analyzed to calculate their danger or risk accurately.
One of the biggest challenges is that cybercriminals, state-sponsored attackers, cyber terrorists, and hacktivists are now using Artificial Intelligence (AI) techniques to circumvent many controls, gain privileged access to an organization’s confidential data, and erase their traces to avoid detection. They use AI to automate and enhance cyberattacks and expand their attack surface. Furthermore, AI goes through continuous advancements that can yield a new chain of cyberthreats.
AI Creates Job Disruption But Not Job Destruction
A common concern surrounding automation in recent years is that it will result in widescale job losses as the work previously done by people is taken over by technology. Of course, the reality doesn’t support this narrative. Indeed, companies that invest in technology often employ more people due to the improvement in their fortunes heralded by the investment.
For more insights on cyber leadership issues, visit the Cyber Leadership Foresight website.
