Looking For AI Exposure? Cyber Security May Have You Covered

One of the complications, and opportunities, confronting the cyber security industry is that the cyber threat may be escalating beyond the capacity of a human-centric response. Consider for instance the remarks of the outgoing chief of the Department of Defense, that "given the volume [of attacks] and where I see the threat moving it will be impossible for humans by themselves to keep pace." The DoD currently finds itself amidst a $1.6 billion project of centralizing its hundreds of separate firewalls into a unified system, the end purpose being to enable effective integration of artificial intelligence capabilities. While this DoD example is an isolated one, it nonetheless epitomizes the human limitation in countering the cyber threat, which is primarily a digitalized, computer-driven hazard. As Benedict Cumberbatch playing Alan Turing in The Imitation Game quipped, "our problem is that we're trying to beat [enigma] with men. What if only a machine can defeat another machine?"