Speaking at the Black Hat Europe conference in London, ING Bank’s Eduardo Barbaro and Roberto Moratore said that “AI is not the final product” and it is just a tool to enable your analysts or engineers to do something that they're currently doing, but better.

Opening by saying that AI is often a synonym for GenAI, Barbaro said analytics is at the core of ING’s work, but often working with analytics can leave “people overwhelmed by data.” 

Silos in the Business

He also detailed how siloed organisations can see “the identity and access management people not discussing with the folks in detection, and they also don't talk too much about vulnerabilities and response.” He said that this level of independence should be removed, and move to “an integrated view where that data can be combined and can be used together.”

However this use of data requires talent, and Barbaro said “you need to think a little bit about the distribution of talent you have in your team and how to start building that analytics team.”

He said: “Cyber is really difficult. I am a physicist by training and a data scientist, and have been working within cyber for a number of years now, but cyber is really difficult, but also analytics is very difficult.

“When you put two very difficult things together, that doesn't equal to easy.”

Connecting Tools

Barbaro also said the use of ‘legacy tools’ also complicates things, while modern tools don't always necessarily connect with the current infrastructure you have, and that creates further challenges. “Not only the connection between legacy and modern tools, but also the understanding between architects, engineers, data scientists, and so on.”

Moving to AI, Barbaro asked how do you know if something is a good fit for AI? “One thing that I say to my team and I say that to myself all the time is that it's not about the AI, it's not the final product,” he said.

Instead, consider AI as a tool to support your analysts and engineers, and maybe they can do it faster, better, or more accurately, or maybe not at all? “Can I automate that? Can I simplify that? This is really important that you need a strategy around your cybersecurity.”

Also when using analytics, Barbaro said you need both the CISO and senior management on board, as well as enthusiastic colleagues, and bring those people together. “Then your analytics starts to cross-pollinate and then just grows,” he said.

Concluding, Barbaro and Moratore said that the hype surrounding AI “doesn't help us” and the hype has been solved. “We had 20 years of AI winter and we don't need another one now, so let's make sure we don't hype things too much.”

Dan Raywood Senior Editor SC Media UK

Dan Raywood is a B2B journalist with more than 20 years of experience, including covering cybersecurity for the past 16 years. He has extensively covered topics from Advanced Persistent Threats and nation-state hackers to major data breaches and regulatory changes.

He has spoken at events including 44CON, Infosecurity Europe, RANT Conference, BSides Scotland, Steelcon and ESET Security Days.

Outside work, Dan enjoys supporting Tottenham Hotspur, managing mischievous cats, and sampling craft beers.