The Spooky Side of AI: Is Your South Denver Business Prepared?
If you look at any South Denver suburb this Halloween, you’ll see countless monsters roaming the streets. Vampires, creatures, and ghouls are all “wreaking havoc” (read: going to parties and trick-or-treating). Is your business prepared for AI-Powered phishing that enters like monsters?
The real monsters, though, don’t look like this. The AI risks we see today don’t announce themselves as a threat, even jokingly. They dress themselves up in the costume of harmless, helpful allies.
While businesses just like yours are using AI tools to supercharge security and productivity, cyber criminals are too. They are using that same power to disguise obvious threats with polish and poise and get into the protected data of your South Denver business.
As Halloween night falls and the monsters come out in full force, remember that keeping your South Denver business safe doesn’t mean being an expert scam-spotter. It means following a few core tenets of security to calmly recognize when you’re faced with AI risks. Garlic around your neck won’t help you here; it’s all about simple processes and safeguards.
AI shapeshifters: Sounding right isn’t enough anymore
Video and audio files used to be a clear differentiator between someone real and someone trying to scam you. Now, with AI-Powered phishing, scammers can take many forms. They will provide realistic voice messages, calls, or even videos to convince you that their requests are legitimate.
Even if you can spot telltale signs of AI video or audio generation, scammers are ironing out those wrinkles quickly. You might not be as good at spotting them as you think as a lot of “AI tells” are already outdated.
Instead of depending on individual detection by employees, focus on hard data that scammers can’t fake. For example, verification procedures for any sensitive request involving money transfers or account changes. These shapeshifters present new AI risks that can fool your eyes. But they can’t fake rigorous security procedures and multi-factor authentication.
AI mummies: Wrapped in a new, more dangerous cloth
In past years, AI-Powered phishing messages had spelling and grammatical mistakes that made them easy to spot. Typos, the overuse of time-sensitive language, and other flaws became the benchmarks to look for in phishing protection.
These same scams have much better costumes now. Dressing up these messages with perfect spelling, grammar, punctuation, and readability gives them a sense of authority. Unfortunately, many employees aren’t as skilled at seeing through those new costumes.
Like an ancient mummy rising from the tomb, these scams are just as dangerous as they’ve always been. But now they have new, fresh rags that disguise how monstrous they really are. Move away from looking for issues within messages to protect your South Denver business. Instead, look for red flags within the requests themselves. Don’t slip into complacency with a scam email just because it gets the details right and is spelled properly.
AI vampires: Never invite them in
In vampire myths, innocents protect themselves by not inviting vampires into their homes. That worked given these creatures could not enter enclosed spaces without direct permission. AI works in the same way. When employees use unapproved AI tools, (a phenomenon called Shadow IT), there are boundless opportunities to expose sensitive data.
An AI tool can’t go into your email and read everything. However, it can find data like a quarterly report full of sensitive financial data that you paste into the prompt field for summation. If you can’t answer the following questions: Where is this information going? Where will the tool would store it? What is the creator of the AI tool able to do with the information? Then don’t invite that tool to have access your protected info. The best defense against AI risks? Better rules to protect your business.
Advancements in AI have made deception tactics and security vulnerabilities cheaper to exploit, faster to implement, and more convincing. Even to trained eyes. If your team can internalize the small steps that protect against threats, even the most sophisticated disguises won’t trip them up.
We can help your South Denver business be prepared
We’ll help you protect your business against the AI risks coming for your data. Schedule a free 10-minute discovery call. We specialize in the South Denver area.
We’ll discuss how your employees are using AI, how your team verifies sensitive requests, and what protections you already have in place. You’ll leave knowing where your biggest gaps are in your South Denver business and which threats are seriously spooky this Halloween season and be able to answer the question: “Is your business prepared for AI?”
Call us at [303-531-0722] or visit our website to schedule yours.
