Human or AI: A CISO's guide to identifying machine threats | TechTarget
Attacks now move faster than most escalation procedures. CrowdStrike recorded an 89% year-over-year rise in AI-enabled adversary operations in its "2026 Global Threat Report." The potential of AI-assisted attacks was realized in late 2025 as Anthropic disrupted a state-sponsored espionage campaign in which its own model carried out 80% to 90% of the work against roughly 30 targets. Human operators intervened at only four to six decision points per campaign. At peak, the AI issued thousands of requests, often several per second.
Defenders can't respond to what they can't identify. Distinguishing machine-driven activity from human activity has become a core SOC competency.
What AI-driven attacks look like
AI cuts costs and raises quality across the attack lifecycle. Security teams are seeing it applied to the following:
- Reconnaissance and target profiling built from public data.
- Phishing and business email compromise written in fluent, personalized prose.
- Voice and video deepfakes used for...
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