GenAI poses a significant threat as cyberattacks increase in 2024.

As hackers develop new methods to infiltrate your devices, Generative AI (GenAI) has emerged as the biggest threat this year, as cybercriminals use ChatGPT and Gemini AI models to up their game. Large Language Models (LLM) are just the beginning of a new disruption in the hacking space.

“It’s important to recognize that this is just the beginning of the evolution of GenAI, and many of the Demos we’ve seen in security operations and application security are very promising,” said Richard Addiscott, senior director analyst at Gartner.

GenAI takes a significant part of information security managers as another manageable challenge, but also offers an opportunity to harness its capabilities to increase security at the operational level.

“Despite the inevitable power of GenAI, leaders will also continue to grapple with other external factors beyond their control that they should not ignore this year,” he added.

The inevitability of third-party cybersecurity incidents is pushing information security managers to focus more on flexibility-oriented investments and move away from advantage-oriented due diligence activities. “Start by strengthening contingency plans for third-party engagements that pose the greatest cybersecurity risk,” said Addiscott.

According to a report published last month, more than one in four organizations have banned the use of GenAI due to privacy and security risks.

Most companies restrict the use of GenAI due to privacy and security concerns, and 27 percent had banned its use at least temporarily, according to the “Cisco 2024 Data Privacy Benchmark Study.”

Companies cited legal and intellectual property rights threats to the organization (69 percent) and the risk of information disclosure to the public or competitors (68 percent) as the most important concerns.