Without doubt, cybersecurity is essential for safeguarding sensitive and private customer and company information held by these companies or their contracted third-party vendors. No network is secure from attacks, and data breaches and the fallout from cybercrime may be very expensive for these businesses. Maintaining awareness of threat vector surfaces and the most recent cybersecurity trends can help organizations prepare for cyber assaults on their infrastructure, network, apps, or Internet of Things (IoT) devices. Here are some areas showing signs of threats lurking in the digital world.
Application Security Spending to Increase
The projection for application security spending is expected to exceed $7.5 billion, according to Statista, as firms moved online to survive the pandemic. But identity theft, zero-day attacks, and hacking might affect any application. Professionals must build secure code, create secure application architecture, implement strong data entry verification, and quickly fix vulnerabilities in order to ensure application security and prevent unauthorized access to or modification of application resources.
More Adoption of Zero Trust Approach
The name Zero Trust, which NIST defines as a collection of concepts and ideas designed to minimize uncertainty in enforcing accurate, least privilege, may become popular in 2023. Adoption of Zero Trust, which was mentioned in the Executive Order on Strengthening the Nation's Cybersecurity, will proceed for good reason. According to IBM, firms using a Zero Trust approach deployed saved on average $1 million in breach costs compared to organizations not using the technique. In addition, the Verizon report claims that 80 percent of data breaches are caused by weak or repeated passwords; however, in a zero trust paradigm, individuals are needed to prove their identity before being granted access to data. Some analysts believe the Zero Trust strategy may potentially replace VPN as more people choose to work from home. By 2023, 60 percent of enterprises will transition away from remote access VPN in favor of Zero Trust, according to Gartner.
Upskilling of Existing Employees
With 3.4 million cybersecurity workers needed globally, executives predict that firms will face difficulties in 2023 due to a shortage of qualified professionals. Further, FinTech asserts that there may be a full-scale talent war in cybersecurity, which would make it impossible for businesses to meet their security requirements internally. One way to address the shortage? Teach current staff how to properly safeguard the cloud. Since it is less expensive than using salary to attract talent and has the added benefit of keeping people engaged, most executives believe that upskilling existing employees is an effective method to tackle this. Staff members are more inclined to stick around a company if they believe they are moving in the right direction, which attracts other potential employees.
Burgeoning Growth of Data
Data is growing more quickly than cybersecurity professionals can handle it. Automated processes are replacing labor-intensive manual procedures that could take hours or even days. According to ISACA, automated cloud environment monitoring will follow suit as daily data volumes rise. The significant cost savings provided by automation and artificial intelligence are in addition to saving the overworked security manpower. According to a Teramind study, companies utilizing AI were able to detect and contain data breaches 27 percent faster than those not using AI, while an IBM analysis revealed that enterprises employing automation to detect and respond to breaches save an average of $3 million compared to those who don't.
Cloud Security
Security in the cloud is a major issue. Enterprises have been moving their workloads to the cloud over time in an effort to reduce their operational costs. Due to concerns about cost, performance, and security, several businesses have also adopted the strategy of moving away from the Cloud. Enterprises should be able to acquire the necessary people and have qualified cybersecurity professionals working to implement the proper security defenses and data protection procedures throughout such architectural modifications and migrations.
Misconfigurations and human mistake are significant barriers to cloud security, notwithstanding the long list of security and privacy compliance measures that are required by consumer-regulated sectors. To protect their cloud infrastructure, businesses will need to step up their security measures in areas like identity and access control, data awareness and protection, and vulnerability monitoring.
Advanced Persistent Threats
Advanced persistent threats (APTs) are threats that have the ability to disrupt company activities by secretly accessing systems. Understanding the APT nexus and reducing these risks are also severely lacking, which has a detrimental effect on the market for APT security. As hackers attempt to seize control of Industrial Control Systems (ICS) running old and insecure software, operational technology (OT) cybersecurity will become a fertile ground for APTs. The market for advanced threat prevention services, which is anticipated to expand at an unprecedented rate in the near future, needs to be supported by integrated security and technology development.
For the time being, companies can manage their assets and secure their web applications by investing in API gateways and web application firewalls. Enterprises can lower the risk exposure to their important systems by regularly patching and strengthening the infrastructure, network, and software components.
Complications with the Metaverse
The market value of the metaverse is predicted to reach $ 237 billion by 2027 (Research and Markets, 2023), and as its popularity rises, user accounts there will be profitable targets for data theft and spoofing. Current owners of these AR headsets risk losing software support from the vendors of the metaverse, who are facing the brunt of shifting business models.
If the metaverse becomes a key hub for carrying out financial transactions, Avatar hijacking will be a frequent threat scenario. Security threats will increase with the integration of numerous cutting-edge technologies including Natural Language Processing (NLP), Artificial Intelligence, Edge Computing, and Blockchain ledgers. Due to its ability to produce human-like and realistic text, animations, and movies in a matter of minutes, generative artificial intelligence has managed to capture the attention of people all over the world. Integration with metaverse will speed up the production of runtime content, but it will also be more difficult for users to tell whether a conversation is taking place with a live person or an interactive computer.
Deep fakes and impersonation threats in the metaverse can be avoided by establishing coding standards and communication protocols to assure the accuracy of the information provided. High-level security automation can be made possible by machine learning and AI, which can also be used to detect AI-based assaults.