Cybercriminals and scammers are getting better, faster, and more sophisticated. The magic of generative AI is helping them generate content and code at a scale and a quality level that wasn’t feasible before. Businesses of all sizes, including yours, are at greater risk today than five years ago.
Here’s the lay of the land across both cyber threats and scams, plus how you and your team can spot the signs and stay safe.
How Cyber Threats Are Changing
For the last few years, ransomware attacks have been the big news: cyber criminals weasel their way into your system, find a way to lock you out, and then demand payment. It’s not good, especially because even if you pay up, you have no guarantee the bad guys will keep their word and restore your access.
Well, ransomware hasn’t gone away, but something new is springing up alongside it: data theft and extortion. In this kind of attack, you don’t necessarily get locked out. Instead, the bad guys lurk around inside your system, find sensitive or proprietary information, and steal it.
Then they show you what they stole and threaten to publish it online if you don’t pay up. In some industries, that would equate to a privacy violation that could rack up huge fines or incalculable reputational damage.
Unpatched Devices Remain a Common Attack Vector
So, you may be wondering: how exactly do the cyber criminals get into your systems in the first place?
Often it’s through unpatched devices. These are internet- or network-connected devices that haven’t been kept up to date with the latest software, OS, or security updates (often called patches).
One of the reasons for those patches — and why they’re called patches in the first place — is to patch up security holes and vulnerabilities. When businesses fail to keep their systems updated, the bad guys can sneak in through those vulnerabilities. They even go looking for specific vulnerabilities like this, seeking out machines running an old version of Windows, for example.
Virtual servers and cloud accounts are also frequent targets because once an attacker gains access to these, they can gain access to tons of information and connected systems.
GenAI Coding Gives Attackers a Boost
GenAI capabilities are changing what attackers can do and how fast they can do it. Of course, you can’t just go to ChatGPT and ask it to write you a virus or a data theft script; it’ll say no. But not every genAI tool is quite so scrupulous. Those in the know can set up their own private LLMs, even hosting them on offline hardware.
Just like you can use genAI tools to draft an email or proofread a document, attackers with some coding knowledge can use coding tools to build attacks faster and more sophisticated than they could have done manually.
How Scams and Fraud Are Changing
We’ve covered this one before in part, but generative AI is giving a supercharge to fraudsters and scammers. Today’s phishing attacks sound much more plausible and often contain convincing graphics — because genAI can crank this kind of content out instantly.
The core techniques are still the same, though: scammers try to rush or pressure you into a rash decision. They ask for information that legit companies don’t. And they use lookalike links and domains (like bankofmerica dot com - notice the missing “A”) to fool you.
Keeping Your Business Safe
So how do you stay safe from it all? There’s good news here: the attacks are changing, but the techniques to stay safe are mostly staying the same.
- Keep all devices, software, and operating systems up to date with the latest security updates.
- Train your team to be suspicious of any email, text, or comm that rushes them or asks for unusual information (like full login credentials, six-digit codes, or remote access requests).
- Implement multifactor authentication or passkeys wherever possible.
Ultimately the best defense is a robust IT approach that includes working with an experienced IT partner like us. Reach out anytime to discuss how we can help.