Artificial Intelligence and machine learning are the kind of buzzwords that generate a great deal of interest; they are tossed all the time around.AI and Machine Learning used in Cyber Security.
When a huge set of data is involved, it seems like a nightmare to have to interpret it all by hand. It is the kind of work one might describe as repetitive and boring. Not to mention the fact that a lot of staring at the computer will take you to figure out what you set out to learn.
The best thing about machines and technology is that it never gets tired-unlike humans. Also, it’s easier designed to notice trends. Machine learning is what you get when you hit the point where your tools are taught how to spot patterns. The AI helps you understand all better and make the answer autonomous.
A potential need for approaches to cybersecurity
Cyber Security solutions are all about spotting a pattern and planning the correct response. Such scanners are based on heuristic patterning. It allows them to identify a piece of code as malicious, though it may be the case that no one has previously identified it as such. Essentially, it has something to do with training the machine to understand you and alert you when something is out of the ordinary.
As soon as something reaches the tolerance level, it activates an alarm. The rest will be up to the user from there on out. For example, the user can instruct the antivirus software to quarantine the infected file. It can do so with or without interference by humans.
AI can learn from observation
Applying AI to cybersecurity solutions brings matters up a knot. Without that, it would not be feasible to let the software learn by studying on its own.
Imagine getting an agency working behind the scenes that know you so well that it can predict every move you make. It may be slight nuances. For example, how you often shift your mouse or the parts of the web that you are browsing, and the order of the programs that you open when you sign in.
The AI will get to know you and your habits reasonably well, without having to present yourself. It would thus shape a digital fingerprint. It sounds frightening but it may be useful. For example, if an unauthorized person ever has access to your computer, it might raise the alarm.
Establishing an image for your daily computer operation
Observing your actions is, of course, not the end of what AI and machine learning can do. Why not do the same for processes in computers?
Imagine yourself having to track which programs are running in the background. Tracking by hand how much energy they use every day, all day. Then, it does not sound right, does it? But it is the function at which AI excels. You will have a strong watchdog without raising a finger, which will start barking as soon as anything is out of the ordinary. For example, it might warn you about malicious activities in the operating system. You’d know about crypto mining malware or other forms of threats that affect your device right now.
The smart malware designers make it such that the use of the CPU in your machine only goes off the charts if you don’t use the PC. There is no way to find a thing like that when you are away from the keyboard unless you have Cyber Security solutions powered by AI to monitor anything for you 24/7.
You can fake an IP, but it’s much harder to fake your operation
Webmasters tend to work to ward off bot traffic and automated scripts. These are used for automated scraping of data and other related activities. One could write a script, for example, to collect every bit of contact information on the website. They would then be able to send unsolicited offers to all those contacts. Also, if contacts are not scraped, nobody wants bot traffic because it absorbs scarce server resources and slows down everything for legitimate browsers. Therefore, the user experience is affected.
The easy solution is to block an array of IP addresses. Yet a script can get around the challenge by using a VPN server, or a proxy. Now let’s put some AI in the equation. It will be able to identify repetitive actions by analyzing the operation of each user. This will connect it with an IP address currently being browsed, and then flag it up. Sure, an IP address can be discarded by a script and attempted with a new. But the fingerprint left by its actions will stay as it is pretty much pattern-based. In the end, automated observation could flag the new IP much more quickly.
AI and Machine Learning used in Cyber Security have profoundly changed the cybersecurity landscape. They’ll keep getting more and more sophisticated as time goes on. It’s uncertain when it would hit the point of being your watchdog for cybersecurity, customized to your needs.
