Blog Detail

Businesses are facing a rapidly changing cyber threat landscape, with cybersecurity trends in 2024 requiring immediate attention. Cyber ​​threat actors are becoming more sophisticated, especially with the recent introduction of AI. Technological innovation and changing business needs have introduced new environments, devices, and software that add up to an expanding cyber attack surface.

All of these trends and changes contribute to the cyber attacks businesses face and the various solutions they adopt to manage them. In addition to Gartner’s top strategic cybersecurity trends, here are some of the top security trends we expect to see in 2024.

 

Cybersecurity Trending Threats

As new vulnerabilities, attack vectors, and malware variants emerge, some threats come to the forefront while others go out of fashion for a while. In 2024, cyber threat actors are largely leaning toward sophisticated attacks that have demonstrated a good success rate and return on investment (ROI) in the past.

Some of the trending cybersecurity threats of 2024 include:

• Ransomware:Ransomware has been a major security concern for several years now. Increasingly, attackers are moving from data encryption to stealing data and demanding a ransom to not disclose it publicly.
• Supply Chain:Major attacks such as the SolarWinds hack demonstrated the potential effectiveness and scale of a supply chain attack. Supply chain threats include exploiting trust relationships between organizations and working to inject vulnerabilities or malicious code into open source libraries and dependencies commonly used within corporate applications.
• Multi-vector attacks: Multi-vector attacks combine multiple attack techniques and vectors within a single cyberattack campaign. Cyber ​​threat actors are using these tactics because they make attacks harder to detect and contain, increasing the likelihood of success.

Top Cybersecurity Trends in 2024

Top corporate cybersecurity trends are commonly inspired by a mix of responses to major cyber threats, new technologies, and long-term security goals. Here are some of the top security trends and technologies defining the cybersecurity space in 2024.

#1. Hybrid Data Center

The rise of cloud computing has provided organizations with greater infrastructure scalability than ever before possible. With cloud environments, organizations can scale their infrastructure up or down as needed.

While some organizations have moved their data center entirely to the cloud, others have adopted cloud computing to augment the on-premises data center. A hybrid data center uses orchestration so that data and applications can be moved between on-premises and cloud-based infrastructure over the network as needed.

The hybrid data center allows organizations to better tailor their environments to their infrastructure and security needs. For example, more sensitive data and applications can be hosted on-premises, while resources that require more scalability can live in the cloud. Using orchestration and connected infrastructure allows these resources to move seamlessly between the two as needed.

 

#2. Using AI in Cyberattacks

Generative AI took off rapidly in 2024. While the technology first entered the public consciousness in late 2022 with the rise of ChatGPT, multiple alternatives have emerged since then.

The rise of AI has significant impacts on cybersecurity, both from an offensive and defensive perspective. On the offensive side, ChatGPT and similar tools have already been used by cyber threat actors to streamline and improve cyberattacks with an overall increase in attacks year over year.

Generative AI has multiple applications for offensive cybersecurity. For example, ChatGPT and similar tools can easily write extremely convincing emails for phishing attacks. It is also possible for an attacker to bypass the security barriers built into these technologies to get them to write malware or teach would-be cybercriminals how to conduct new attacks.

While AI also has numerous potential use cases in the defensive realm, its increasing maturity creates an arms race between attackers and defenders. Whichever side makes the most effective use of it will likely have a significant advantage in the future.

 

#3. Hybrid Mesh Firewall

Corporate networks are becoming increasingly distributed and heterogeneous. With a mix of remote, cloud-based, and on-premises locations, it can be difficult to deploy and manage firewall solutions that provide consistent security protection and compliance across an organization’s network environment. However, delivering this consistent security is also critical to protecting the organization against advanced attacks.

To solve this challenge, organizations are increasingly turning to hybrid mesh firewalls, which combine multiple types of firewalls into one integrated, centrally managed security architecture. This allows organizations to deploy the firewall solution that makes sense for a particular environment, but also maintain centralized visibility, management, and policy enforcement across their entire infrastructure.

 

#4. CNAPP

The emergence of cloud environments has had a dramatic impact on application development and security. Cloud environments enable rapid DevOps development cycles and can eliminate the need for developers to maintain and secure the environments where their application resides. Additionally, the growth of the cloud has encouraged the use of containers to ensure that the application can move freely between on-premises and various cloud environments.

These changes in application development also carry significant impacts on application security (AppSec). Cloud applications often function differently than their on-premises counterparts and operate in a distinct deployment environment. As a result, they require AppSec solutions tailored to their unique needs.

Gartner defined the cloud-native application protection platform (CNAPP) to describe security solutions that integrate the various capabilities required for cloud AppSec into a single solution. By integrating multiple capabilities into a single solution and dashboard, CNAPP helps combat cloud security sprawl and enables security teams to more effectively monitor, manage, and protect their cloud-based application.

 

#5. Threat Exposure Management

The increasing volume, sophistication, and speed of cyberattacks means that a reactive approach to cybersecurity is not effective. To effectively manage their cybersecurity risk and protect against increasing cyberthreats, organizations must proactively take steps to assess and manage their risk exposure.

Threat Exposure Management (TEM) is a risk-focused approach to strategic security planning. Security teams identify potential threats to the organization and assess the risk each poses to the business. Based on this information, the organization can develop, prioritize, and implement mitigation strategies for various risks.

As the cyber threat landscape and various regulations demand a more risk-focused approach to security, businesses are increasingly adopting TEM. By performing this threat identification and assessment process regularly, the organization can maintain visibility into evolving threats and ensure it is prepared to address new attack vectors.

 

#6. Comprehensive Protection

Corporate IT environments have evolved rapidly and become more diverse in recent years. The rise of the cloud had significant impacts on corporate IT environments and application development. Hybrid and remote work expanded the role of mobile devices in the workforce. The Internet of Things (IoT device) has become more sophisticated and ubiquitous, a trend that the maturation and expansion of the 5G mobile network will likely encourage.

Because of this expansion, businesses are faced with a much broader range of threats and potential attack vectors than ever before. Cyber ​​threat actors can target vulnerabilities in traditional endpoints, mobile devices, IoT systems, and remote work infrastructures. With more systems to monitor and protect, security teams are more likely to miss something, allowing attackers to gain access to their systems.

The end result of all this technological growth and innovation is a massive expansion of organizations’ cyberattack surface. Organizations must identify a broader range of potential attack vectors and ensure they have solutions ready to manage these risks.

 

#7. Security Consolidation

The expansion of corporate attack surfaces and the increasing maturity of the cyber threat landscape has resulted in an explosion in the number of security tools that enterprises operate. With many potential threats, enterprises need to close the security gap, and in the past they often did so by applying point security products designed to address a specific attack vector or improve security on a particular platform.

 

However, the remainder of this focus on point security solutions is a complex and unusable security architecture. Each tool generates alerts and notifications, adding to alert fatigue and making it difficult for security personnel to identify and remediate real threats. Additionally, the need to operate many different security solutions increases training requirements, introduces the need to constantly switch context between multiple dashboards, and increases the risk of security gaps and inconsistent enforcement of security policies. With cybersecurity trends in 2024, these difficulties are further exacerbated.

As a result of these challenges, many organizations are taking a step back and focusing on improving security through security consolidation. Instead of disconnected point solutions, they are looking for integrated platforms that provide the security capabilities they need in a single solution. These platforms offer improved visibility and increase the efficiency and effectiveness of threat detection and response by reducing manual processes and cognitive load on security staff.