What keeps CISOs up at night? For hundreds of senior company leaders across countries and industries, the steady growth of cybercrime is one of their biggest concerns. Consequently, organizations spend more money than ever to mitigate the risks and consequences of data breaches, despite a new wave of attacks being on its way as we speak.

2019 has already proven a year during which cryptojacking and AI-generated phishing has gained ground. We have written a comprehensive article about the upcoming security threats titled 2019: New Vulnerabilities Increase Threat Levels, and in this post, we are going to take a closer look at some of them.

Increase in Attacks Leading up to Elections

So far this year, we have experienced the calm before the storm of major elections worldwide, bringing with them the growth of hacking attempts against organizations, political parties, and, perhaps, even the voting system itself. One can, therefore, expect an increase in efforts to protect, educate, and secure businesses and state organizations against these influence-seeking attacks.

Data is the key enabler here with threats possibly coming from social channels, applications, and various communication systems. Therefore, companies will have to ramp up their threat intelligence programs by using such tools as threat intelligence platforms to distinguish unreliable sources from those that are real and have a better understanding of the threat landscape.

AI-Generated Images and Videos

The latest advances in artificial intelligence have allowed scientists to create imaginary faces with stunning realism. Also known as a “deepfake”, the technique is capable of producing fake images and videos of a person that can be difficult to discern. This could be another technology that hackers can exploit in the near future.

In fact, AI-generated phishing campaigns are already happening, and it won’t take long for threat actors to start using highly realistic photos or videos en masse to support their malicious deeds. They may even use the technology to manipulate stock prices, for instance, by publishing fake news of a CEO announcing the financial demise of his or her company.

Cryptocurrency Abuses

Cryptojacking is a relatively new digital threat that is plaguing the world of cryptocurrency. The process works when a hacker inserts a piece of code in computers or mobile devices, which then uses up their resources to gather digital currencies. So just like in many cyber attacks today, the main motive of threat actors here is financial gain.

Cryptocurrency abuse is capable of taking over web browsers while compromising various systems. The main danger is that the malicious cryptojacking viruses that hackers use are designed in such a way as to remain hidden for as long as possible and, therefore, cause more damage. However, software like threat intelligence platforms can be utilized to analyze suspicious behaviors in a company network and counteract the threat.

Attacks from the Cloud

Agencies that host the data of other organizations on their servers are appealing targets for hackers. By getting past their defenses, perpetrators not only can gain access to the IT entire infrastructure but most importantly are free to reach out and grab sensitive clients’ data that are stored there.

Major companies like Google and Amazon can spend money to invest in cybersecurity fortifications heavily, but even that doesn’t mean they are immune from being breached. However, smaller cloud computing firms should be even more alert against threats as malicious individuals are most likely to focus on them in the first place, expecting that their security protocols are considerably weaker.

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From the potential of AI being abused to state-sponsored cyber threats, organizations have indeed had many concerns so far in 2019. By focusing on technologies that can enhance their digital protection, companies stand a better chance of minimizing the consequences of cybercrime and Threat Intelligence Platform can help in this regard.