- 5G technology will make it easier for hackers to engage in criminal activity and will result in “massive cyber attacks” this year, according to former White House CIO Theresa Payton.
- Payton told attendees that, as the ongoing pandemic leads to innovations in cyber crime, 5G connectivity will allow hackers to accelerate cyber attacks at an unprecedented scale due to existing cyber security issues going unresolved.
- This will lead to a smart city reliant on 5G falling victim to a cyber attack by the end of the year, Payton predicts. She didn’t name a specific city, meaning that it could be smart city pioneers such as Singapore or Dubai, as well as London, which is becoming increasingly powered by 5G as the UK continues its nationwide rollout.
- Payton also shared her predictions on ‘artificial intelligence poisoning’, which she described as the practice of hackers breaching and changing algorithms responsible for training AI, leading to the technology performing tasks which it was originally not intended to do.
- “AI will be cyber criminals’ weapon of choice,” she said. “And it’s going to continue to help them crack more and more accounts, networks and data stores.”
– Sabina Weston | April 13, 2021
