In recent years, businesses have been boosting their spending on cybersecurity and strengthening security measures to outmaneuver cybercriminals. However, malicious actors have been advancing their techniques, resulting in an ongoing conflict between those safeguarding their data and those attempting to pilfer it. To stay ahead in this evolving field, professionals often pursue an online cyber security masters to deepen their expertise and tackle emerging challenges effectively. To ensure secure teamwork, you need to keep up with cybersecurity trends. We’ll talk about what’s trending in cybersecurity in 2024.

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Cybersecurity Trends and Innovations

#1 Priority on On-Demand Access

You need high-speed access to ubiquitous and large data sets for mobile platforms, remote work, and other shifts. This increases the risk of a breach. The marketplace for web-hosting services is expected to reach $183.18 billion by 2026.

By collecting extensive customer data, organizations can better understand and influence purchasing behavior and forecast demand. In 2020, each person on Earth generated 1.7 megabytes of data per second on average.

As the cloud becomes more important, enterprises must store, manage, and protect these data while dealing with explosive data volumes. To succeed, companies require new technology platforms like data lakes to aggregate vendor and partner assets across environments.

Companies are not only gathering more data but also centralizing them on the cloud, granting access to various individuals and organizations, including suppliers.

#2 Identity-First Security

The essence of this approach lies in individually managing and monitoring identities rather than handling access in a more widespread manner across the organization. The main objective of identity-first security, as a key cybersecurity trend, is to enhance control over privilege escalation, entitlement exposures, and credential misuse.

That is, it is now reasonable to implement the use of VPN on employee work devices as part of company policy since they can access corporate servers anywhere. This approach also has hidden advantages, such as the ability to bypass filters, geo-blocking, or save on price differences.

Although to do this you will have to figure out how to change VPN location, it is not that difficult. The main thing is to choose a reliable VPN. You might want to change your VPN to a different one if yours isn’t secure enough.

#3 AI/GenAI

One of the upcoming trends in cybersecurity revolves around how the industry will be affected by the use of artificial intelligence (AI) and generative AI (GenAI).

With AI and GenAI becoming affordable and accessible to everyone, there will be an increase in cloud attacks enabled by GenAI, according to Chen Burshan, CEO of Skyhawk Security.

“These attacks will reshape how we approach offensive security to address the changing risk landscape, impacting categories such as continuous threat exposure management (CTEM), breach and attack simulation (BAS), pen testing, and more,” he says. “Although this change may take a year or more to fully manifest, 2024 will mark its onset.”

#4 An Interconnected Network of Vulnerabilities

You may have noticed that the Internet of Things (IoT) is expanding rapidly. In fact, by the end of 2024, it’s estimated that the number of IoT devices will reach a staggering 15.14 billion. Unfortunately, this rise in popularity also brings an increased risk of cybercrime. As more devices connect to the IoT, the likelihood of hackers infiltrating them grows.

The IoT has its fair share of cybersecurity horror stories, revealing that hacking these devices isn’t as difficult as it may seem. While some hacks may appear harmless (like a hacked kettle), the truth is that any IoT device can serve as a gateway to entire networks. This means that a hacker could potentially gain access to your smartphone or PC through that seemingly innocent kettle.

#5 More Regulation

In 2024, you will witness the implementation of faster regulation aimed at better controlling the situation in the cybersecurity sector. Governments are becoming increasingly concerned about the potential damages caused by cyber-attacks, particularly those targeting critical infrastructures. This has led to a shift in the way cyber regulation is approaching.

To address this, heftier penalties for cybercriminals, increased legal obligations for CISOs, and the establishment of regulatory frameworks dealing with cyberattack-related ransoms are being considered. Developed countries have already demonstrated their commitment to working on legislation to combat cyber threats, although the governmental response may vary.

#6 Hybrid Data Centers

Cloud computing has revolutionized infrastructure scalability for organizations, offering the flexibility to scale up or down as needed. Some organizations have fully shifted to the cloud, while others have adopted it to enhance their on-prem data centers. Hybrid data centers leverage orchestration to move data and applications seamlessly between on-prem and cloud-based infrastructure.

This approach allows organizations to customize their environments for specific infrastructure and security requirements. For instance, sensitive data and applications can be hosted on-prem, while cloud resources provide enhanced scalability. Seamless resource movement is facilitated through orchestration and connected infrastructure.

#7 Quantum Computing

https://www.quantumcomputinginc.com/blog/quantum-computers-replace-classical/

Most organizations are probably familiar with the concept of quantum computing, leveraging the principles of quantum mechanics to solve problems that traditional computers cannot handle. However, many companies may still have a vague understanding of its implications as a cybersecurity threat.

One of the major concerns revolves around the potential problem that quantum computing poses to conventional encryption methods. Many current encryption techniques rely on the complexity of factoring large prime numbers – a task that quantum computers greatly simplify.

If quantum computers become easily accessible, there is a looming risk that they will break the encryption protecting critical information, such as financial transactions or governmental communications.

#8 Collaboration Between DevOps and DevSecOps

By 2024, you should prepare for a series of transformative trends in the application programming interface (API) market. You need to adapt and address vulnerabilities at the earliest stages of development, with a growing focus on pre-production testing and security integration.

Additionally, the evolving dynamics of DevOps and DevSecOps will necessitate closer collaboration between cybersecurity professionals and software engineers.

Moreover, the increased reliance on automation presents both opportunities and challenges. On one hand, it promises to speed up code-writing and shipping processes. But on the other hand, it may result in an overwhelming number of untested APIs that require quick and efficient security assessments.

Conclusion

While the mentioned cybersecurity trends might portray a gloomy scenario, it is important for you, as part of the business world, to not despair. Instead, consider them as warnings that should motivate you to take action. The year 2024 will present challenges for cybersecurity teams worldwide, given the growing number of attacks and their increasing sophistication.

Thankfully, you have two powerful tools at your disposal to confront this imminent threat. On one hand, new technologies may create vulnerabilities, but they can also assist in preventing and mitigating attacks.

On the other hand, training remains crucial in containing and limiting these attacks. By combining both approaches, you can take the first step towards improved prevention in 2024. This is a year that encourages everyone to take action against cyber threats.

This article was submitted by an online author.