Around 5.5 million new startups are launched in the United States every year. Unfortunately, around half of them will go bankrupt within the first five years. Many people are aware of these sobering statistics, but they don’t think about all of the possible causes of business bankruptcies. One of the most overlooked problems is cybercrime.
An astonishing number of companies are at risk of going under due to a cyberattack. Sadly, cybercrime is becoming a lot more common since criminals have easy access to AI technology. Business owners need to use AI detectors to help stop these crimes.
Startups Are Even More Vulnerable to Cybercrime in the Age of AI
Many entrepreneurs are blissfully unaware of the serious risks that cybercrime poses to their startups. Here are some frightening statistics on the topic:
- 60% of businesses are affected by data breaches each year
- 60% of businesses that are victims of a data breach go out of business within six months
- 20% of businesses in Europe are already in danger of bankruptcy due to a potential cyberattack
AI technology is making cybercrime a bigger problem than ever. One survey found that 71% of hackers felt it made their job easier. This was a huge increase from the 21% that said the same thing the previous year.
There are a lot of ways that hackers and scammers are using AI to commit fraud. Some of them include the following:
- They use generative AI to create phishing emails, which have affected 83% of businesses. AI helps criminals create phishing emails more easily and makes them more effective. AI is especially helpful for hackers targeting people in other countries, since AI can write in the native language of their targets.
- Some hackers are using AI to create deepfakes of trusted figures, such as the company CEO, law enforcement officials and VIP customers. They can use this ill-gained trust to dupe their victims into sending money or sharing sensitive information.
- A lot of hackers are using AI to create malware that helps them exploit their targets.
There are a lot of ways that cybercriminals can harm startups with AI. Fortunately, there are safeguards that business owners can take to prevent these crimes.
AI Detectors Are Going to Be Essential for Protecting Startups from Cybercrime
An AI detector is a program designed to see if content is created by AI. Some of these programs are trained to look at text content, while others inspect visual content such as images and videos.
They are trained on thousands of documents that were written by both humans and generative AI. Here are some of the ways that AI detectors distinguish human-written content from that generated by AI:
- AI detectors look for unpredictable content. They have identified patterns from AI content, because it tends to follow a similar template and share the same ideas. If the content has ideas that it has not seen repeatedly in AI-generated content, then the AI detector will be less likely to flag it as being made with AI.
- They notice that content made with AI tends to repeat the same words and phrases throughout the document.
- They also notice that AI content has strange patterns, such as having lots of words in close proximity to each that start with the same letter.
These programs are getting better and better at telling whether content is made with AI, especially if the user didn’t take steps to avoid AI detection. Here are some ways they can help entrepreneurs protect their startups.
Fighting Phishing Scams
Most hackers and scammers use phishing emails as part of their social engineering strategies. They often pretend to be a trusted correspondent, so they can trick their target into sending them money or divulging sensitive information.
More criminals are using AI to commit these scams these days. This makes it easier for them to create a lot of personalized emails that don’t have lots of suspicious grammatical errors.
AI detectors can help entrepreneurs to identify phishing emails made with AI. This helps them guard against these scammers.
Avoid Falling Victim to Fake Reviews Tricking Them Into Downloading Malware
A growing number of scammers are also tricking people into downloading malware. There are over 200 malicious apps on the Google Play store that have over eight million installs.
Many of these scammers are using AI to create fake reviews to get more people to download these malicious programs. AI detectors can help entrepreneurs avoid falling for them.
Identifying Deepfake Videos and Images
Hackers are also using deepfake videos and images to trick their victims. Some AI detectors are designed to detect visual media that was made with AI, so entrepreneurs may want to use them to fight deepfakes.
Entrepreneurs Can’t Take These Concerns Lightly
Cybersecurity is going to be very important for any new startup. Entrepreneurs need to use all tools at their disposal to avoid these risks as more criminals use AI to exploit their startups. AI detectors are going to be some of the most important tools at their disposal.