As IBM Security vice president of strategy and design Kevin Skapinetz stated, cybercrime has evolved to a point that it is completely different from how we used to visualize hackers. The days where hackers are isolated individuals are long gone. The threats we are dealing with now are highly organized, elaborate, and constantly changing.

In line with this, traditional security methods may no longer suffice. Banking on program-based measures as a line of defence, these methods lack flexibility. Given an ever-changing terrain of threats, security analysis would easily fall short employing these.

Smarter security

In order to deal with these elaborate cyberthreats, equally smart and elaborate solutions must be employed. IBM’s solution is the integration of Artificial Intelligence (AI) on our cybersecurity systems.

According to Skapinetz, AI is integrated in cybersecurity by augmenting the abilities of security analysts to assess threats. It does this by collecting large volumes of information which allows it to learn to discern cyberthreats and potential risks. It then analyzes how threats are related to one another, allowing the security analysts to act accordingly based on the analysis and insights. This largely cuts down on the time required to respond to threats.

In comparison to the traditional security methods, the flexibility of using AI is remarkable. It heightens threat detection accuracy, with the ability to distinguish threats in a myriad of forms.

Apart from being ever-changing, the cyber terrain is also ever-expanding. With the traditional security methods that we have, tracking down threats is slow and inefficient. Soon as we get to the threats, new ones may have already popped up. With AI, we can scale through the torrent of information and detect threats fast.

Providing a smarter and faster way to battle threats, AI integration is a definitely highly welcomed innovation in cybersecurity.