Key facts
- AI has helped double the number of digital flaws discovered year-on-year.
- AI can find bugs and create exploits in hours, shortening the time for defenders to fix issues.
- Cybercriminals have so far failed to cobble together a working tool to exploit the recent PHP vulnerability, according to Hunt.io.
- Cloudflare CEO Matthew Prince predicts "a couple years where every single week it’s going to feel like the sky is falling."
Advances in artificial intelligence have uncovered a significant number of new software vulnerabilities, which cybersecurity experts predict will lead to further disruptions similar to recent outages affecting government websites. Research from threat intelligence firm VulnCheck indicates that AI has contributed to a doubling of discovered digital flaws year-on-year. Matthew Prince, CEO of Cloudflare, warned of a challenging period ahead, stating that "every single week it’s going to feel like the sky is falling."
Recent outages that impacted government sites in Europe and elsewhere were linked to weaknesses found in PHP, a widely used programming language. The cybersecurity community is rushing to patch these vulnerabilities, with some opting to take sites offline temporarily to ensure safety. This scramble occurred during an already intense week for cybersecurity, which also saw disclosures related to Node.js, Plex, LiteLLM, Railway, and a weak cryptographic key used by eMudhra.
Experts note that AI models can now rapidly identify bugs and develop exploits, significantly shortening the time available for defenders to react. While some believe this could lead to a hacker free-for-all, others argue that AI-discovered bugs are often complex and difficult to weaponize, and that more disclosed vulnerabilities do not necessarily translate to more successful attacks. As of Thursday afternoon ET, cybercriminals had not yet successfully developed a tool to exploit the PHP vulnerability, according to Hunt.io.