AI Attacks & Threats: What are they and how do they work?

Discover more about AI cyber-attacks and how to protect your business against them.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is undoubtedly changing the world as we know it. But while this emerging technology has many benefits, it also brings the possibility of AI cyber-attacks. Bad actors can use AI to increase the effectiveness of existing threats and create new attack vectors. To stay ahead of the curve, businesses must consider how to protect their systems against various AI attacks.

Check out our guide to the OWASP LLM Top 10 for a deep dive into AI risks.

What is an AI attack?

Bad actors can manipulate an AI system deployed by the organization to serve a malicious purpose. This attack occurs when a bad actor finds limitations in a machine learning (ML) model and exploits them.

Threat actors can also use AI to drive their offensive attack technology. They use AI to automatically generate a higher volume of attacks or generate exploits themselves, making it more difficult for organizations to protect themselves.

Why CISOS need to be aware of AI attacks

CISOs must consider both threats — the greater volume of offensive attacks driven by AI technology and the possibility of their own systems getting used against them. As businesses leverage AI for more critical infrastructure, it becomes increasingly important to defend against AI attacks.

How do AI attacks work

Bad actors can leverage AI systems on their end for an offensive attack, enabling them to exploit organizations on a much larger scale. AI empowers attackers to create more convincing phishing and social engineering schemes, making staff members more likely to fall for these ploys.

Attackers use AI to enhance the following attack methods:

LLMJacking: the unauthorized hijacking or manipulation of a large language model (LLM) to gain control, extract sensitive data, or alter its behavior.

Phishing: Attackers can leverage Generative AI to create targeted phishing emails, making these emails more believable to victims.

Malware & vulnerability discovery: Malicious actors can also use AI to find system exploits and create malware. For instance, recent research proved that ChatGPT can generate dynamic, mutating versions of malicious code. This new technology lowers the bar for cyber attackers by enabling novices to carry out sophisticated exploits.

Social engineering: Attackers can use deep fake technology to generate audio and video of a familiar, trustworthy person, convincing targets that they are this person.

What are the most common AI attacks?

Along with enhancing existing attack vectors, AI allows bad actors to create new methods that pose unprecedented risk to today’s organizations.