AI will heighten global ransomware threat, says NCSC

By Alex Scroxton for ComputerWeekly
Wednesday, January 24, 2024

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Artificial intelligence (AI) will be leveraged to increase the volume and impact of cyber attacks involving ransomware between now and 2026, the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) has warned in a report.

“Impact overestimated”

But Ilia Kolochenko, CEO and chief architect of ImmuniWeb, rejected the premise of the report outright. “The impact of generative AI on cyber crime growth seems to be overestimated, to put it mildly,” he said.

“First, most cyber crime groups have been successfully using various forms of AI for years, including pre-LLM [large language model] forms of generative AI, and the introduction of LLMs will unlikely revolutionise their operations,” said Kolochenko.

“Second, while LLMs can help with a variety of simple tasks, such as writing attractive phishing emails or even generating primitive malware, they cannot do all the foundational tasks, such as deploying abuse-resistant infrastructure to host C&C servers or laundering the money received from the victims.

“Third, the ransomware ‘business’ already works very well,” he said. “It’s a mature, highly efficient and effective industry with its own players, economy, laws and hierarchy.” Read Full Article