Scams and cyberattacks have been on the rise for years, but new technology — mainly, artificial intelligence — is making them more sophisticated, as well as progressively harder to detect and avoid before it’s too late.
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Offenders are impersonating federal agents, landlords, famous figures and even your loved ones, with the ability to mimic voices on a phone call or disguise a phony email or link as legitimate. Some people have even been tricked into unwittingly participating in a scam ring themselves, or, according to a new report, had their own AI-powered helpers and online tools turned against them.
The study, from <a href="https://bitcomme.com/stop-and-shop-offers-a-10-percent-discount-this-weekend-following-cybersecurity-incident/” title=”Stop and Shop offers a 10 percent discount this weekend following cybersecurity incident”>cybersecurity firm Semperis, found that AI is now utilized in a whopping 84% of ransomware attacks, which involve installing software programs on victims’ devices and then demanding payment to access the crucial, often private information therein (hence the “ransom” in the name). And as algorithms advance, perpetrators are getting more practiced and confident in using them, especially in cases where they wouldn’t be able to do the technical work themselves.
How do ransomware attackers get in?
There are various tactics for a scammer to gain access to your computer, phone or other device, including by directing you to click on fraudulent links, through phishing emails that dupe you into revealing passwords or other sensitive information, or by simply finding vulnerabilities in your operating systems and programs — including your own AI tools.
In some cases, a human doesn’t even have to be the one directly carrying out the crime, as AI is now able to infiltrate systems, lock them down and issue threats autonomously upon instruction, says Semperis’s strategic advisor, Chris Inglis, who formerly served as the U.S. National Cyber Director under Biden.
“I think we’re already seeing autonomous attacks. Autonomous ransomware attacks are included in the mix,” Inglis told CBS News when speaking about the report’s findings. “AI is an inflection point in their capacities to hold the same things at risk… [it] increases the capacity, scope and scale of attacks in understanding the weaknesses in your system or increasing the sophistication of their approach.”
