How real is the AI threat for security teams?
Artificial intelligence (AI) is attracting huge attention amongst the media and mainstream. When you look at the criminal underworld - this is no different. While many herald this technology as ushering in a new era of cybercrime, some cynics are dubious about its uses and capabilities. AI has quickly become a transformative force, capable of enhancing our everyday lives, with new tools to streamline, enhance and personalise an array of areas that impact our everyday lives. It has also been argued that AI is quickly becoming seen as a double-edged sword, with the potential to open the doors to a new generation of cyber criminals and increasingly more sophisticated and advanced cyber-attacks.
In today's threat landscape, cybercriminals are constantly evolving and adapting, seeking new innovative ways to exploit the latest technology, and AI has quickly cemented itself as a powerful tool to enhance and improve their malicious activities. Many argue that AI will allow for far more sophisticated and effective cyber-attacks, adding even more pressure on stretched IT teams to be aware of the latest threats.
For partners and managed service providers (MSPs) who are tasked with safeguarding their customer's organisations, understanding the breadth and reality of today's AI-driven cyber threats has never been so important. The cybersecurity landscape continues to shift and change, and its important organisations are able to stay afloat, implementing sophisticated solutions, whilst fostering and maintaining good security hygiene. In this increasingly challenging battle against cyber threats, organisations need to ensure they have the capabilities to anticipate and defend against AI-enabled attacks, ensuring they stay robust and resilient.
For MSPs, partners and organisations alike, understanding; how likely cybercriminals are to use AI to breach defences, steal sensitive data, or disrupt operations; what specific AI techniques, tools and procedures (TTPs) criminals are most likely to employ; and what strategies can organisations implement to best bolster their security strategy and protect themselves from AI-enhanced attacks, is crucial for navigating a new wave of threats.
Are AI threats keeping adversaries divided?
Opinions around AI tools and large-language models like ChatGPT are mixed amongst cybercriminals. Many are seeing new opportunities, leveraging AI for tasks such as sophisticated social engineering attacks. AI tools can be used to generate highly sophisticated, accurate and convincing phishing lures, creating cybercriminal activities which are difficult for even the most experienced to detect.
Sophos X-Ops found that threat actors are divided when it comes to their views and attitudes towards AI. A mix of competent users and inexperienced cyber criminals soon became keen adopters of this technology, readily sharing jailbreaks and LLM-generated malware and tools, even when the outcome is not always effective.
However, on the other hand, there has been a lot of scepticism about the reliability and effectiveness of these generative AI tools such as WormGMT and FraudGPT, viewing them as overhyped or unreliable for generating malware. As many threat actors have been leveraging AI for social engineering and mundane coding tasks, there has been much concern about the security and detectability of AI-generated code.
While there has been some growing interest in generative AI among cybercriminals, its real-world applications remain limited and often speculative.
How are cybercriminals using AI?
However, for many cybercriminals, generative AI technologies such as ChatGPT and DALL-E, are being increasingly exploited to carry out sophisticated large-scale scam campaigns. These new advances in AI have significantly lowered the barriers for a new generation of cybercriminals to create sophisticated cyber threats, providing a whole new set of challenges.
Recent research from Sophos found adversaries are experimenting with generative AI, with AI tools being used to facilitate the production of fake websites, images, and even audio through automation, making it even easier to deceive unknowing victims on a much larger scale. Today's detection methods are struggling to keep pace with the speed and sophistication of this new era of cyber threats, highlighting the need for organisations to implement advanced security solutions.
Today's threats shouldn't be faced alone. With MSPs on hand, customers can benefit from the most advanced and robust solutions that detect and respond to AI-powered malware and scams. It's a risk too big to ignore and these solutions are essential in protecting both individuals and organisations against the evolving threat landscape of AI-enabled cyber threats.
How can partners and MSPs prepare for the threat weaponised AI?
The threat of AI-driven attacks is real, offering the world a whole host of new problems. This is no different for MSPs and partners, faced with new challenges that are sophisticated, automated, and accessible for all, from the most experienced cyber criminals to the most novice adversaries. Weaponised AI has the power the enhance phishing and social engineering attacks, creating lures that are both convincing and effective.
To combat the risks that AI poses, MSPs and partners need to prepare through smart and strategic investment into AI-powered security solutions that are capable of detecting and responding to threats in real-time. Evolving threats demand a thorough and strategic approach through round-the-clock monitoring, advanced threat intelligence, and security awareness which can ensure organisations are kept ahead of the constantly shifting threat landscape.
For all but the largest of organisations, managing your security is a difficult feat, which is why small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) should entrust their security strategy with MSPs and partners who can ensure all valuable data is kept secure. Through adopting a zero-trust approach and implementing advanced endpoint protection, or managed detection and response (MDR), organisations can bolster a proactive security strategy. Through leveraging today's advanced technologies, MSPs and partners can ensure they're prepared for emerging threats as the threat of weaponised AI attacks continues to rise.