This blog is the second in a three-part series written for National Cybersecurity Awareness Month. [previous post and final post]
We live in a world centered around 24/7 connectivity, making cybersecurity a 24/7 concern.
This is receiving special attention throughout the month of October, as the tech community recognizes National Cybersecurity Awareness Month by spotlighting cybersecurity issues and hosting public discussions about the latest tools, threats and trends affecting consumers and businesses alike.
The theme of this year’s National Cybersecurity Awareness Month is “Our Shared Responsibility,” and true to theme, Dell teamed up with the National Cyber Security Alliance and Nasdaq to sponsor their cybersecurity summit in New York City.
The summit, held at Nasdaq headquarters, brought together some of the most influential leaders in the tech and cybersecurity space to discuss how today’s interconnected world is changing our society and the risks that come along with those changes. Panelists talked about how emerging technologies like artificial intelligence and machine learning will both drive new vulnerabilities and help solve them. I was happy for the opportunity to be a part of the event.
I took part in the panel “Securing Breakthrough Technologies – The Next Five Years.” The panelists and I discussed how refinement of breakthrough technologies like artificial intelligence and machine learning will play an important role in the advancement of cybersecurity techniques and technologies.
The main consensus was that artificial intelligence and machine learning is needed to analyze the billions of security events we receive daily, filter out the noise, identify what’s safe and not safe and provide quality information for security professionals to examine. With the volume of data that’s being produced in organizations, matched by the volume of threats, IT professionals today need this advanced technology to stay ahead.
Later in the afternoon, I joined a panel with representatives from Cylance, Nutanix, and PhishMe for a more in-depth discussion on artificial intelligence. The panel, “Artificial Intelligence – Friend or Foe?” further explored how innovation and the proliferation of connected devices is providing new attack vectors and a lucrative market for cybercriminals. On the other hand, the data from these devices can provide a plethora of insight to strengthen machine learning and help humans do their jobs better and more efficiently.
In the panel, I highlighted that there isn’t an area of security at Dell that isn’t using some form of artificial intelligence to help them do their jobs better. In the area of advanced threat prevention, AI today can predict the malicious intent of a piece of software, and detect anomalous behavior with more advanced security information and event management (SIEM) products to generate indications of a compromise or attack.
Looking ahead, some of the big opportunities with AI lie in further advancements in generating valuable insights from security events, contextual access controls and data classification. Combining the sensitivity of the data itself with context about who is accessing it, where, how and on what device will be key to further protecting data from malicious activity and insider threats. In addition, there is an opportunity to better automate response to threats. Today, we manually address security issues as they happen. The next step is to be able to analyze an event or piece of information, decide on the response and automate that, in order to speed time to resolution and free up IT and security professionals to focus on what’s important.
In the realm of cybersecurity, using AI and machine learning is in its infancy and we’ve only just scratched the surface of what’s possible. Taking advantage of advanced technology solutions and modernizing our security infrastructure will help us to protect our data and prevent threats while still allowing employees to be productive.