The AI Threat Landscape: How Adaptive Security is Redefining Cyber Defense
Cybersecurity professionals are facing an unprecedented challenge. The rise of generative AI has transformed attack vectors from theoretical risks to immediate, sophisticated threats that can penetrate even the most robust organizational defenses.
Brian Long understands this landscape intimately.
As CEO and co-founder of Adaptive Security, he’s witnessed the dramatic acceleration of AI-powered cyber attacks firsthand.
“We’ve seen a huge increase in these types of attacks since ChatGPT came out,” Long explains. “Email phishing attacks are up by 4x and deep fake attacks are up by 17x from 2023 to 2024, with over 100,000 attacks last year alone.”
The numbers are staggering.
What was once a rare occurrence has become a daily operational risk for organizations across every industry.
The New Attack Surface
Modern cyber-attacks have evolved beyond traditional phishing emails and rudimentary social engineering. Today’s threats leverage sophisticated AI technologies that can impersonate executives, infiltrate hiring processes, and create deeply personalized attack strategies. Long shared a chilling example of how AI can extract personal information:
“We took a LinkedIn URL and put it against several language models. They were able to figure out an engineer’s five-month-old child’s name by tracing connections through his wife’s job posting for a nanny.”
This level of data aggregation represents a fundamental shift in privacy and security. Non-technical actors can now access and weaponize personal information with unprecedented ease.
Training: The First Line of Defense
Adaptive Security isn’t just identifying problems – they’re creating solutions. Their platform represents a quantum leap in security awareness training, allowing organizations to generate custom, interactive training modules with AI-powered content. At their recent Black Hat conference event, the company unveiled capabilities that allow organizations to:
- Generate completely custom training modules by uploading documents
- Create AI-powered simulations using deep fake technologies
- Conduct realistic phishing tests across multiple communication channels
The Technology Behind the Solution
What sets Adaptive Security apart is their holistic approach to understanding potential attack vectors. Their platform doesn’t just simulate attacks – it predicts them by analyzing available online information.
“We look across different language models and figure out what’s accessible about someone,” Long explains. “Then we use AI to determine how an attacker might strategically target an individual or organization.”
The Privacy Erosion Paradigm
Perhaps most concerning is the rapid deterioration of personal privacy. With open-source AI models proliferating and computational costs plummeting, sophisticated attacks are becoming democratized.
“The costs of these models have gone down over 90%,” Long notes. “You can now find over a million open-source models on platforms like Hugging Face that can run on high-end smartphones with no moderation.”
This means a single motivated individual can potentially launch attacks against thousands of targets with minimal technical expertise.
Practical Recommendations for CISOs
For security leaders, the message is clear: traditional defense mechanisms are no longer sufficient. Organizations must:
- Implement comprehensive AI-powered security awareness training
- Develop robust verification processes for remote interactions
- Continuously educate teams about emerging AI threat landscapes
- Invest in technologies that can simulate and predict advanced attacks
Looking Ahead: The Next Frontier
The future of cybersecurity isn’t about building higher walls – it’s about understanding and anticipating threats before they materialize. AI will be both the weapon and the shield in this ongoing digital arms race.
Call to Action
CISOs and security professionals can explore Adaptive Security’s capabilities by visiting adaptivesecurity.com. The company offers a free self-guided tour and demonstrations that include simulated deep fake voice and video scenarios.
About the Author
Pete Green is the CISO / CTO of Anvil Works, a ProCloud SaaS company and co-author of “The vCISO Playbook: How Virtual CISOs Deliver Enterprise-Grade Cybersecurity to Small and Medium Businesses (SMBs)”. With over 25 years of experience in information technology and cybersecurity, Pete is a seasoned and accomplished security practitioner.
Throughout his career, he has held a wide range of technical and leadership roles, including LAN/WLAN Engineer, Threat Analyst, Security Project Manager, Security Architect, Cloud Security Architect, Principal Security Consultant, Director of IT, CTO, CEO, Virtual CISO, and CISO.
Pete has supported clients across numerous industries, including federal, state, and local government, as well as financial services, healthcare, food services, manufacturing, technology, transportation, and hospitality.
He holds a Master of Computer Information Systems in Information Security from Boston University, which is recognized as a National Center of Academic Excellence in Information Assurance / Cyber Defense (CAE IA/CD) by the NSA and DHS. He also holds a Master of Business Administration in Informatics.
