Indian firms tighten AI defences as cybercrime gets more sophisticated

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Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. As Generative AI (GenAI) transforms business operations, it is also escalating cyber threats. Sophisticated cyberattacks leveraging AI-powered deepfakes, phishing, data manipulation, and malware are on the rise.

To combat these complex threats, Indian companies are looking to upgrade their security infrastructure, experts said. Cybersecurity attacks that started around the 1980s have evolved in the past forty-odd years. Earlier, what was only about corrupting standalone devices with viruses now has the capacity to cripple an entire organization and even country.

“Cyberattacks are currently in the 5th or 6th generation of what is known as multi-vector attacks. These are not only targeting your endpoint devices, but also your networks, data centres, cloud, etc. All of it is happening in parallel, making it much more complex and sophisticated, and difficult to prevent," said Devroop Dhar, co-founder of management consulting firm Primus Partners.

Multi-vector attacks are highly sophisticated cyber threats that exploit multiple vulnerabilities simultaneously to breach an organization's defences. A typical example is a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack that combines multiple techniques, such as flooding networks and overwhelming systems, to maximize disruption. Coupled with other sophisticated technologies such as machine learning, artificial intelligence (AI) can both be a boon or a bane depending on who is using it.

Many cyber criminals are using AI technology to intensify their attacks. On the other hand, companies are using AI to build advanced cybercrime protection systems. “AI is a double-edged sword.