AI’s extraordinary capabilities have the potential to transform cybersecurity, but AI systems themselves must be protected from attacks to prevent harm to people, process and technology.
Forms of artificial intelligence (AI) have existed since the 1950s, but the technology is now rapidly expanding at scale for two reasons: more powerful and more affordable computer chips that make it possible for organisations of all sizes to access AI; and the explosion in digital data which provides the information for training AI systems.
The use cases are everywhere in our daily lives, from email spam filters to virtual assistants. However, as digitisation spreads, the risk of attacks from bad actors accessing connected devices or systems increases, making AI an increasingly important area for cybersecurity. AI will revolutionise cybersecurity, due to its superior ability to scan enormous volumes of data for anomalies and flag up risk.
Organisations with AI capabilities have a challenge to seize the opportunity to reinforce their security, while guarding against AI-enabled systems becoming another point of vulnerability. In recent years, cyber criminals have exploited advances in AI to make their attacks more damaging and more frequent, as organisations around the world have learnt the hard way.
Against this background, 74% of respondents to our 2021 Middle East CEO Survey regard cyberattacks and leaks as a threat to growth this year, up from 68% in 2020. As a result, 43% plan to increase their investment in cybersecurity and data privacy by at least 10% over the next three years. Clearly, a growing proportion of the region’s business leaders have grasped that in an accelerating AI race, they have to move fast to stay one step ahead of potential cyber attackers.
In this report and video series, we set out how organisations can ramp up their cyber defences with AI, while protecting this new and powerful technology against attacks
Ali Khan
Shallika Sharma
Mohammed Saty
Semih Kumluk
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