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The world's tech behemoths, such as Google, Amazon, and Facebook, are becoming more transparent about their AI research. The need to recruit top-tier talent, including AI researchers from academia, is one good reason for this.
Fremont, CA: AI has rapidly evolved from a far-fetched theme in old-school science-fiction movies to one of the most prolific emerging technologies – and, by extension, one of the most recognizable buzzwords out there – in the last decade. Almost every industry today, including healthcare, transportation, manufacturing, banking, agriculture, retail, and finance, has implemented or plans to implement AI in some form. It's the defining technological trend of our time, influencing everything from voice-activated consumer electronics to factory robots. People know this because many of the firms working in these fields make their AI use public. What could be more forward-thinking than announcing a new AI-powered initiative? It's as much a marketing ploy as it is a measure of product and service effectiveness.
An Uncertain Situation
The world's tech behemoths, such as Google, Amazon, and Facebook, are becoming more transparent about their AI research. The need to recruit top-tier talent, including AI researchers from academia, is one good reason for this. To be able to attract those candidates, it's often necessary to allow them to continue publishing their work, which inevitably leads to more transparency about their AI research and development.
In contrast, the security space seems to have a lot more ambiguity and embellishment. There's a group of cybersecurity firms that claim to be working in AI but are actually doing something more akin to statistics 101. These companies pretend to be working behind closed doors on some algorithmic secret sauce, when in fact, they're just trying to get people to ignore the wizard behind the curtain.
Cybersecurity Should Not be a Self-Centered Industry
This closed-minded attitude must change. Otherwise, this industry will devolve into a market of lemons, with the lowest-quality products succeeding because they are less expensive to produce, reducing the presence of information asymmetry and tarnishing the reputations of both cybersecurity in general and AI in particular.
One choice for giving direction on how suppliers talk about their solutions and use of AI could be smart rules. Another option is for businesses to simply take the proactive step of opening up. The more open vendors are, the more likely they are to inspire others to join them in having more relevant and meaningful conversations with buyers – while also encouraging vendors to seek new ways of developing AI applications in cybersecurity.