5 Trends Shaping Cybersecurity Strategy: AI Threats, SASE, ZTNA & XDR

From ransomware attacks clobbering the industrial sector to innovative AI-boosted cyberthreats, 2023 was marked by a relentless wave of high-profile cybersecurity incidents. The cybersecurity landscape is brimming with challenges. That said, we can certainly expect organizations to evolve their counter-defense measures in response to escalating threats. Let’s explore five trends likely to shape cybersecurity this year.

1. Zero-Trust Gains More Traction

Conventional perimeter-based security defenses are no longer relevant because they were built for a different era before cloud and remote work evolved into what it is today. Before, users inside the perimeter were trusted by default. Today, the corporate environment is vastly different: users want ubiquitous access to data, applications and services stored in the public cloud.

This necessitates a dramatic shift away from the traditional perimeter-centric security model in favor of a per-session-based (explicit trust) model that dynamically enforces access policies for applications and data. Hence, this is where zero-trust comes in. Gartner predicts that by 2025, more than 60% of enterprises will embrace zero-trust and consider it a logical starting point for protecting critical enterprise assets. Even the White House has mandated federal agencies to transition to zero-trust security by 2027. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) also developed the zero-trust maturity model, serving as a standard reference for its implementation.

2. The Shift Toward SASE Continues to Accelerate

We have reached an inflection point where the status quo is no longer sufficient for delivering advanced security services. Enterprises that migrate applications to the cloud and adopt hybrid work environments are finding that outdated security controls pose higher risks and hinder compliance mandates. Security convergence is the only strategy for this, and secure access service edge (SASE) presents a way to manage threats across enterprise, remote and cloud environments. SASE provides enhanced visibility for zero-trust access and threat detection and response capabilities from a cloud-delivered service. For this reason, expect to see more organizations accelerating their moves away from legacy infrastructures to SASE.

3. AI and ML Power More Cybersecurity Solutions

Artificial intelligence and machine learning tools will feature more prominently in cybersecurity platforms. We will continue to witness AI/ML capabilities scanning all networks, applications and data, searching for threats and accelerating detection and response capabilities. We will also see an expansion of these in defense of endpoints, data security and adaptive zero-trust access.

Advanced AI/ML techniques will strengthen extended detection and response (XDR) tools to more accurately identify and anticipate threats and provide real-time correlation and analysis of threat data. AI/ML tools may also enhance threat response and containment processes; for example, autonomously isolating infected machines and alerting the security team. This will simplify security operations and enhance the team’s effectiveness.

4. SASE, ZTNA and XDR Converge

Despite organizations increasing their security budgets every year, cyberattacks continue to succeed and threat actors continue to remain undetected in victim networks for days, sometimes months. To improve threat detection and response, organizations need three things: 1) A converged security platform to secure all users, devices, apps and data; 2) zero-trust network access (ZTNA) to define granular access policies for critical applications and services; 3) analyze all traffic flows to detect and remediate potential security threats – extended detection and response (XDR).

SASE eliminates the need for fragmented hardware because it converges multiple security tools into a single software stack, delivered from the cloud. Since all network traffic flows across the SASE backbone, it has full visibility to quickly detect and respond to security threats. Given this scenario, it’s easy to imagine the benefit of converging ZTNA and XDR into SASE. This may explain why Gartner pegs the SASE market at $25 billion by 2027.

5. Cyberinsurance Expands Along With Insurer Scrutiny

Cyberthreats will continue to expand in frequency and severity, making cyberinsurance an important hedge against worse-case scenarios for businesses. As risks increase, so will financial losses for successful attacks. This puts upward pressure on premiums and more stringent audit requirements. Cyberinsurance carriers will closely scrutinize policyholders, evaluating their security posture, risk management strategies, employee cybersecurity awareness programs and disaster recovery plans. Any or all of these will determine the amount and breadth of coverage. This puts more pressure on enterprises to spend more time and effort selecting the right carrier and meeting policy requirements.

As organizations, governments and individuals navigate the tide of evolving threats, the importance of establishing robust mitigations has never been more urgent.

A commitment to proactive defense, the growing adoption of AI/ML, and the convergence of SASE, ZTNA, and XDR will draw the battlelines for a secure cyberfuture.