Generative AI, a revolutionary technology in the field of IT security, is making waves among industry vendors. Companies like Microsoft and Google are incorporating generative AI and large language models (LLMs) into their security offerings, showcasing the potential of this powerful technology.
While generative AI, particularly ChatGPT, has become a hot topic, there are certain constraints that limit its usefulness in the security space. These constraints include the lack of access to the live Internet and safety tuning. However, security practitioners deal with real-time threats and a constant influx of new tactics and techniques. To unleash the full potential of generative AI, it is essential to connect it to the local enterprise data store and allow access to the Internet.
Leading security providers have recognized this need and are facilitating Internet access and providing APIs to their security-specific generative AI solutions. They are also training the LLMs using their extensive troves of security intelligence. This opens up opportunities for forward-thinking security services providers and enterprise security leaders to consider integrating generative AI into their security operations center (SOC) strategies. By infusing tools and processes with this powerful capability, they can enhance the effectiveness of their security operations.
Generative AI offers several benefits to different members of the SOC team. For Level 1 cybersecurity specialists, who triage a stream of alerts to confirm true positives and filter out false positives, generative AI can provide a deeper understanding of alerts and help in decision-making, especially during inconvenient hours. It has the potential to automate triaging and prioritizing alerts, reducing the workload on specialists.
At Level 2, cybersecurity analysts take over from Level 1 and investigate incidents, compiling relevant data. In the managed security services space, where analysts deal with diverse customer environments, generative AI can be a valuable resource. It can quickly provide explanations of sequence events, threat nature, and vulnerability, enabling analysts to develop deep expertise in using generative AI. Effective prompt engineering, knowing how to structure a prompt for optimized responses, becomes crucial.
The most sophisticated users of generative AI are Level 3 analysts who leverage this technology to speed up their work in threat response, forensics, and threat hunting. They can employ generative AI to write scripts or search queries for further investigation.
Furthermore, generative AI can assist in various other roles within a SOC. SOC engineering can use it to identify vulnerable configurations or issues that impact hardware performance. Threat content management can benefit from generative AI by capturing new threat intelligence and adding it to the platform. Even customer support can utilize generative AI to help non-writers create informative and accurate emails regarding events in their infrastructure.
The implementation of generative AI effectively has the potential to enhance the mean time to detect and respond to threats, a primary goal for every security team. However, there are considerations to keep in mind. Cybercriminals may misuse generative AI to develop sophisticated threats and to identify vulnerabilities. It is important to understand the limitations of generative AI, such as its reliance on training data, the potential for incorrect or biased results, and the need to ask the right questions to obtain accurate answers.
Generative AI can address pain points in the cybersecurity industry, such as the shortage of skilled professionals and the complexity of protecting infrastructures. It is not meant to replace people but to help them be more effective and productive when utilized correctly.
In conclusion, generative AI is a powerful technology that, when implemented thoughtfully, can significantly improve IT security. By leveraging its capabilities, security teams can overcome challenges, enhance their operations, and ultimately protect their organizations from evolving cyber threats.