PGH Networks

Sophos' Ben Verschaeren

Lunchbox Leaders: Artificial Intelligence Recap

Artificial Intelligence Recap

 

During the fourth episode of our webinar series, The Lunchbox Leaders, we heard from Ben Verschaeren of Melbourne, Australia, a Global Solutions Engineer with Sophos— an international cybersecurity company based in the United Kingdom. 

Ben shared that there’s been a rapid shift in technology over the last 5 years with an explosion in data science and artificial intelligence (AI). Sophos in particular has utilized AI to shift away from reacting to threats and instead makes security predictions with incredibly high accuracy. Ben also shared how AI can assist across all layers of defenses by providing both accurate predictions and detections of malicious behavior. 

“Our Sophos lab alone sees about half a million unique malware files every day,” Ben shared. “Using things like AI, we’re enhancing our labs. One of the ways we’re able to enhance detection capabilities is by applying algorithms that will tell us what looks different. What’s something that’s probably malicious, but looks different? And maybe that’s where an analyst should set focus to.  We’re not actually using AI just to deter malicious or benign determination, but rather to funnel the right information to people so maybe we can find that next group out there that’s been hiding in the shadows and not been detected yet. There are so many different applications for it. I would never look at AI as competing with a human. I would look at AI as complementing or enhancing human capabilities.”  

The efficiency that AI is bringing to all different industries is really the value driver. It’s changing the way we do things. “Data is what drives AI/neural networks now,” Ben stated. With such huge volumes of data, AI is a game-changer in terms of handling the information available to us and identifying patterns that allow us to predict and prevent cybersecurity threats

However, Ben cautioned that organizations searching for an AI cybersecurity solution should certainly question and query the AI provider to determine exactly what capabilities their AI product has, rather than just purchasing the product based solely on the “AI” buzzword. Be cautious and ask specific questions to understand how the tool is protecting your organization. 

We were so glad to host Ben in our fourth installment of the Lunchbox Leaders series. Our vision has been to help educate our community on how organizations and individuals can protect themselves in today’s cybersecurity threat landscape. We hope you found this episode, and our series of webinars, insightful!

Remember the team at PGH Networks can help you develop a strategic and layered approach to your network’s security and protect you from cyber-attacks. Want to learn more: contact us today

In case you missed our fourth and final episode (or would like to rewatch it), you can find the full recording online