How AI is Enhancing Cybersecurity Measures

Cybersecurity is vital to our online lives. From grade school kids to professionals to retired grandparents, most of us spend a significant amount of time on the Internet. Unfortunately, cybercriminals lurk in the most innocent corners of our online activity, waiting to strike. Cybersecurity measures are utilized on our smart devices, many organizations have a focused cybersecurity team, and for the most part, we’re protected from threats that we aren’t even aware of. However, cyberattacks remain a risk that we must proactively combat. The rapid evolution of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and its integration into every private and public sector can present new sophisticated scams to avoid, but conversely, AI also enhances cybersecurity protection. When used for good, AI has numerous cybersecurity benefits and can increase safety and peace of mind. Cybersecurity is the proactive and strategic protection of apps, data, platforms, networks, and operating systems from targeted unauthorized access, use, damage, and theft. Cybersecurity professionals use different strategies, practices, and technologies to assess, mitigate, and prevent cyberattacks . AI tools are implemented to take care of a wide variety of tasks, and can range in their learning abilities and autonomous behavior. However, AI is a technology that allows computers and machines to perform tasks that previously required human intelligence. AI training simulates human comprehension, communication, creativity, decision-making, language, learning, and problem-solving. AI models operate with human input, but minimal human oversight, and perform complex tasks that they master through experience, improvement, and exposure to new data for a wide range of applications. Chatbots, self-driving cars, and predictive text are all examples of current AI. AI enhances cybersecurity through automated responses, strong vulnerability management, and increased threat detection. Pre-AI cybersecurity programs are static models that need to be updated constantly and cannot pivot to make decisions they aren’t programmed to make. AI learns over time, and problem-solves based on experience, and frees up cybersecurity professionals to concentrate on larger, more complex tasks. Here’s a closer look at how AI is enhancing cybersecurity measures in new ways: AI benefits cybersecurity by detecting and preventing numerous attacks. 70% of cybersecurity professionals find AI extremely effective at identifying and flagging previously undetectable threats. Close to 75% of cybersecurity teams are shifting to an AI-driven approach to threat prevention. AI systems are great at quickly identifying and mitigating the following cyberattacks: Although AI enhances cybersecurity, it can also be used to launch sophisticated attacks and exploit weak security measures. AI-powered cyberattacks include adversarial attacks that subtly change input data to mask threats, data poisoning (corrupting the training data you use to teach your AI models), and AI model theft. The risks of AI in cybersecurity also include: The best AI cybersecurity tools address multiple methods of protection and threat detection. If you opt to use any of the following tools, you can enjoy the peace of mind that enhanced cybersecurity can bring. Arctic Wolf (and the brand’s acquired firm, Cylance) is a cybersecurity company specializing in endpoint solutions that use both AI and machine learning to analyze file behavior, identify malicious code, and provide incident response in real-time. Arctic Wolf’s Aurora Endpoint Security greatly reduces your risk of a cyberattack. CrowdStrike is an extremely popular option for AI-enhanced cybersecurity. The company specializes in cloud-based endpoint protection and offers multiple products to address cross-domain attacks, insider threats, malware, and more. The Enterprise Immune System (EIS) from Darktrace utilizes AI-powered network analysis, self-learning threat detection, investigation, and prediction. Darktrace specializes in detecting both known and novel threats in real-time. SentinelOne offers autonomous endpoint protection by providing data-driven, real-time threat analysis, detection, and protection.  The cybersecurity tools from SentinelOne address threats across networks, cloud platforms, containers, and user endpoints to keep organizations safe from cyberattacks. Vectra AI boasts AI-driven cybersecurity that can catch threats 99% more than human security measures. Vectra AI tracks and identifies potential attackers across cloud platforms, networks, and various identities used. The AI-driven platform detects even subtle threats in real-time. This helps you to stop cybercriminals in their tracks. To protect yourself against cybersecurity threats, check out the free cybersecurity tools from What Is My IP Address and for more on AI’s role in cybersecurity, visit our blog or listen to our Easy Prey podcast available on your favorite podcast platforms.