Latest news with #Wiz
Bangkok Post
7 days ago
- Business
- Bangkok Post
AI in the cloud creates new security challenges
The rapid adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) is intensifying cloud security risks, making it vital for businesses to have strategies to protect AI in the cloud, says an Israeli cybersecurity firm. 'AI is fast becoming a major challenge for many organisations, with its use accelerating significantly,' Charles Kennaway, a major account executive for Southeast Asia at Wiz Inc, an Israeli-American cloud security firm, told the first Thailand-Israel Cybersecurity Workshop, held recently in Bangkok by the Israeli Embassy. Cloud-based managed AI services, such as Amazon SageMaker, Azure AI, and GCP Vertex AI, are found in more than 70% of all cloud environments, indicating an incredibly fast adoption rate. This surge in AI adoption mirrors the early days of cloud computing, creating massive adoption issues, while governance and security processes lag behind, said Mr Kennaway. The company's ' State of AI in the Cloud in 2025 ' report found AI is now a key player in cloud operations, with managed AI services increasing from 70% to 74%, while 85% of organisations are using either managed or self-hosted AI services or tools. 'New players like DeepSeek have seen explosive growth due to cost-effectiveness and rapid innovation, but this 'AI gold rush' underscores that innovation should not compromise security,' he said. According to Wiz, the growing use of generative AI (GenAI) is introducing unique cybersecurity threats, including data poisoning, where training data is manipulated to skew AI outputs; model theft; adversarial inputs that mislead AI; and model inversion attacks that extract sensitive training data. Supply chain vulnerabilities also pose risks, particularly through third-party dependencies. An emerging concern is the rise of 'vibe coding', where users with little coding experience rely on AI to generate code. While convenient, this can lead to insecure applications, as critical practices like secrets management are often overlooked by non-experts. The rise of AI also adds complexity to cloud security, especially in multi-cloud environments, noted the firm. Meanwhile, decentralised ownership limits visibility, making it harder for security teams to monitor threats. Sensitive data is highly exposed, with public information breaches possible in less than eight hours, noted Wiz. Teams also face alert overload and burnout, making it difficult to prioritise real risks effectively. Fighting 'shadow AI' Mr Kennaway said that to address GenAI security challenges, organisations must adopt a proactive and agile strategy, focusing on eliminating 'shadow AI' by gaining visibility into all AI usage, preventing unauthorised tools, educating users, and tracking AI assets through an AI Bill of Materials (AI BOM). AI BOM is a complete inventory of all the assets in an organisation's AI ecosystem, documenting datasets, models, software and hardware across the entire life cycle of AI systems. These details provide the visibility that organisations need to secure AI systems. Shadow AI refers to the unauthorised use of AI tools and applications within an organisation without the knowledge or approval of the IT department. He said enterprises should also ensure sensitive data is not exposed via unsecured AI tools by using an AI and data security posture management approach to monitor and secure data continuously. Firms should use the built-in safety features of large language models, such as content filtering and abuse detection, to reduce risk at the source, said Mr Kennaway. Moreover, enterprises should detect and remove attack paths by conducting continuous vulnerability scans and audits to identify and remediate risks proactively. In addition, they should create a dedicated AI security response team among existing security operations for quick issue containment.
Yahoo
7 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
North Korean Hackers Are Using Fake Job Offers to Breach Cloud Systems, Steal Billions in Crypto
North Korean hacking groups are using the lure of freelance IT work to gain access to cloud systems and steal cryptocurrencies worth millions of dollars, according to separate research from Google Cloud and security firm Wiz. Google Cloud's H2 2025 Cloud Threat Horizons Report reveals that Google Threat Intelligence Group is 'actively tracking' UNC4899, a North Korean hacking unit that successfully hacked two companies after contacting employees via social media. In both cases, UNC4899 gave the employees tasks that resulted in the employees running malware on their workstations, enabling the hacking group to establish connections between its command-and-control centers and the target companies' cloud-based systems. As a result, UNC4899 was able to explore the victims' cloud environments, obtaining credential materials and ultimately identifying hosts responsible for processing crypto transactions. While each separate incident targeted different (unnamed) companies and different cloud services (Google Cloud and AWS), both resulted in the theft of 'several millions worth of crypto.' The use of job lures by North Korean hackers is now 'quite common and widespread,' reflecting a considerable degree of sophistication, Jamie Collier, the Lead Threat Intelligence Advisor for Europe at Google Threat Intelligence Group, told Decrypt. 'They frequently pose as job recruiters, journalists, subject matter experts, or college professors when contacting targets,' he said, adding that they often communicate back and forth several times in order to build a rapport with targets. Inside North Korea's Hiring Scams Targeting Crypto Firms Quick to act Collier explains that North Korean threat actors were among the first to quickly adopt new technologies such as AI, which they use to produce 'more convincing rapport-building emails' and to write their malicious scripts. Also reporting on UNC4899's exploits is cloud security firm Wiz, which notes that the group is also referred to by the names TraderTraitor, Jade Sleet, and Slow Pisces. TraderTraitor represents a certain kind of threat activity rather than a specific group, with the North Korea-backed entities Lazarus Group, APT38, BlueNoroff, and Stardust Chollima all behind typical TraderTraitor exploits, Wiz said. In its analysis of UNC4899/TraderTraitor, Wiz notes that campaigns began back in 2020 and that from the beginning, the responsible hacking groups used job lures to coax employees into downloading malicious crypto apps that were built on JavaScript and using the Electron framework. The group's campaign from 2020 to 2022 'successfully breached multiple organizations,' according to Wiz, including Lazarus Group's $620 million breach of Axie Infinity's Ronin Network. TraderTraitor threat activity then evolved in 2023 to incorporate the use of malicious open-source code, while in 2024, it doubled down on fake job offers, primarily targeting exchanges. Most notably, TraderTraitor groups were responsible for the $305 million hack of Japan's DMM Bitcoin, and also the $1.5 billion Bybit hack in late 2024, which the exchange revealed in February of this year. Arizona TikToker Sentenced for Aiding $17M North Korean IT Worker Scheme Targeting the cloud As with the exploits highlighted by Google, these hacks targeted cloud systems to varying degrees, and according to Wiz, such systems represent a significant vulnerability for crypto. 'We believe that TraderTraitor has focused on cloud-related exploits and techniques because that is where the data, and thus money, is,' Benjamin Read, Wiz's Director of Strategic Threat Intelligence, told Decrypt. 'This is especially true for the crypto industry, where the companies are newer and likely to have built their infrastructure in a cloud-first manner.' Read explained that targeting cloud technologies enables hacking groups to impact a wide range of targets, increasing the potential to make more money. These groups are doing big business, with 'estimates of $1.6 billion in cryptocurrency stolen so far in 2025,' he said, adding that TraderTraitor and related groups have workforces 'likely in the thousands of people,' who work in numerous and sometimes overlapping groups. 'While coming up with a specific number is difficult, it is clear that the North Korean regime is investing significant resources in these capabilities.' North Korea Targets Crypto Professionals With New Malware in Hiring Scams Ultimately, such investment has enabled North Korea to become a leader in crypto hacking, with a February TRM Labs report concluding that the country accounted for 35% of all stolen funds last year. Experts said all available signs suggest the country is likely to remain a fixture in crypto-related hacking for some time to come, especially given the ability of its operatives to develop new techniques. 'North Korean threat actors are a dynamic and agile force that continuously adapts to meet the regime's strategic and financial objectives,' Google's Collier said. Reiterating that North Korean hackers are increasingly making use of AI, Collier explained that such use enables 'force multiplication,' which in turn has enabled the hackers to scale up their exploits. 'We see no evidence of them slowing down and anticipate this expansion to continue,' he said. Sign in to access your portfolio
Time of India
05-08-2025
- Business
- Time of India
Cofounder of the company Google bought for $32 billion says, engineers using AI to code should remember, hackers too can …
As artificial intelligence transforms software development into lightning-fast " vibe coding ," cybersecurity must evolve to match developers' accelerated pace, according to Wiz cofounder and CTO Ami Luttwak . The Israeli-American cloud security firm, Google 's $32 billion acquisition target, is adapting its approach as AI enables developers to build applications "a hundred times as fast as before." "If builders can 'vibe-code' an app in an hour, security has to vibe right alongside," Luttwak told Business Insider. The executive warns that traditional centralized security models cannot keep up with AI-empowered development teams where "a builder can 'vibe code' something in one hour" and "there are hundreds of developers to every one security person." Security teams overwhelmed by AI development speed The proliferation of AI coding tools has fundamentally shifted the development landscape, turning "every developer into a feature factory," Luttwak explained. This transformation creates new challenges for security teams already struggling with limited resources. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Use an AI Writing Tool That Actually Understands Your Voice Grammarly Install Now Undo "We must forget everything we've done until now and approach security very differently," he emphasized. "It's not just the number of applications increasing – it's the number of people in the company who can build stuff." Traditional security approaches treated cybersecurity like "a building inspector" model, where developers needed approval before proceeding. This centralized system breaks down when developers can rapidly prototype and deploy applications using AI assistance. Making security 'boring but impactful' work accessible Luttwak advocates for democratizing security through self-service tools that integrate seamlessly into developers' workflows. "We say security has to be democratized – self-service. We simplify the complexity so anyone can own security," he said. The challenge extends beyond technical solutions to cultural shifts within engineering teams. "Security is mission-critical to a company, and yet it's seen as second-class within engineering. It's second-class, but it's also boring," Luttwak acknowledged. His proposed solution: "We need to find a way as an industry to allow you to vibe code, but also vibe security while you do it." This approach requires designing security tools that are as intuitive and accessible as consumer products like the iPhone , enabling any developer to implement robust security measures without specialized expertise.
Mint
05-08-2025
- Business
- Mint
This VC firm is striking gold, reaping $11 billion from Figma, other startups
Index Ventures, a venture firm with origins in Europe, is the envy of Silicon Valley. A string of large startup exits could send more than $11 billion in proceeds to Index and its limited partners at a time when the venture market overall is still struggling to generate cash. As the largest venture backer of software-maker Figma, Index has turned its $86.5 million investment in the company over the years into a stake worth nearly $6 billion, based on the most recently disclosed share volume and intraday Monday prices. Figma's IPO last week stunned the market when its shares jumped 250% in the first day of trading. Index sold about 5% of its holdings at the IPO price of $33, generating about $108 million, and continues to retain a stake of greater than 15% in Figma post-IPO. The stock fell by about 20% on Monday but is still trading well above its listing price. Figma provides browser-based collaboration tools to help users design websites, mobile apps and social media posts. Index also reaped a windfall from the recent investment by Meta Platforms into tech/ai/meta-in-talks-to-invest-14-billion-in-scale-ai-hire-ceo-alexandr-wang-5268564e">Scale AI, which paid out shareholders, and Google's pending acquisition of cybersecurity company Wiz. Index, whose performance this year has been noteworthy among VC-watchers due to its smaller size compared with rivals, was among the earlier investors in each of these three companies, helping it to notch massive profits. Index made more money than Sequoia Capital, widely considered the top venture firm in Silicon Valley, for both Figma and Wiz. Sequoia backed Figma at a later stage—its stake in the company is just over half the size of Index's ownership—and didn't invest in Scale. It was the first investor in Wiz, alongside Index and the Israeli firm Cyberstarts, but ended up with a smaller overall stake. The number of rainmakers at a single firm is also notable, with each of the recent successes led by different Index partners. 'The performance they've delivered, and are delivering here in the future, is unbelievable," said Miles Dieffenbach, managing director of investments at Carnegie Mellon University, and a limited partner in Index funds, in a recent podcast interview. 'They could raise as much capital as they want to and they don't. They are the most performance-driven culture that we see." When Meta acquired a 49% stake in Index portfolio company Scale AI in a bid to amp up its Superintelligence Labs unit, the firm received more than $1.4 billion, according to a person familiar with the situation. Index also struck gold earlier this year when Alphabet's Google agreed to buy its portfolio company Wiz, an Israeli cybersecurity provider, for $32 billion, in one of the largest tech acquisitions in history. Index's stake in Wiz would be worth $4.3 billion should the Google deal finalize, The Wall Street Journal previously reported. Founded in Switzerland in the 1990s, Index first expanded to London and then opened a San Francisco office in 2011. That's about the time when Index Partner Danny Rimer spotted Dylan Field, an energetic 18-year-old intern making a presentation for a startup in which Index had invested. About a year later, Field and his co-founder and former computer science teaching assistant at Brown University, Evan Wallace, came to Index's office to pitch their new startup Figma. At that time they were the only employees at the company, recalls Terrence Rohan, who was an investor at Index at the time and joined Figma's board to represent the firm. Impressed by the demo of their browser-based product-design tool, Index made an offer and eventually negotiated itself into a leading position for Figma's 2013 seed round with a $1.8 million check. 'It was a high conviction shot by Index," said Rohan, who is now managing director at seed venture firm Otherwise Fund. Some venture firms were making a multitude of small seed investments in companies without dedicating significant resources to the startups, he said. Index's strategy, by contrast, was to lead, join boards, and offer support, he said. The Figma seed deal came out of Index's sixth fund, Rohan said. That fund also backed Robinhood, among others. 'It's done many, many turns," he said of the fund. Index stuck with Figma through multiple rounds of funding. The company took years to release its product and suffered a setback after a proposed $20 billion acquisition by Adobe was called off due to regulatory concerns. Index, meanwhile, was growing too but it avoided the kind of massive expansion that top venture firms like Sequoia and Andreessen Horowitz have pursued lately. Last year, Index raised $2.3 billion in capital for two funds, less than it collected for its prior set of funds in 2021. 'Not many outsiders can enter Silicon Valley and so quickly rise to prominence," said Hussein Kanji, founder of London-based Hoxton Ventures, who has co-invested with Index.
Yahoo
04-08-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
The cofounder of Wiz, Google's $32 billion acquisition target, says vibe coding must be met with 'vibe security'
Google's $32 billion bid to buy Wiz challenges the notion of a mega-deal drought in tech. Ami Luttwak helped build Wiz through a pandemic and a new tech paradigm. He tells Business Insider why the rise of AI demands new security approaches. When Google agreed to buy Israeli-American cloud security firm Wiz earlier this year, making for the search giant's largest acquisition, it threw a $32 billion bucket of water on the idea that the mega-deal drought was here to stay. In March, Google agreed to acquire the five-year-old startup at an all-cash price roughly equal to Iceland's gross domestic product last year, pending regulatory sign-off. The acquisition now stands as an early litmus test of the Trump administration's willingness to green-light pricey Big Tech mergers and acquisitions. For Wiz cofounder and chief technology officer Ami Luttwak, the moment feels like déjà‑vu— the same founding team sold its last outfit, Adallom, to Microsoft in 2015. Founded in March of 2020, Wiz crash-landed in a pandemic that yanked workloads out of on-prem server racks and thrust them into the cloud almost overnight. The crew pivoted from network exposure to cloud security and says that within 18 months, it was posting $100 million in annual recurring revenue. Now the company finds itself riding an even wilder wave. The ability of artificial intelligence to write code has turned every developer into a feature factory. However, Luttwak says the proliferation of new attack surfaces leaves most security teams overwhelmed and outnumbered. Luttwak's answer? If builders can "vibe-code" an app in an hour, security has to vibe right alongside. In an interview at Business Insider's headquarters in New York City, we asked Luttwak about building a company through a pandemic, a new tech paradigm, and making cloud security part of an engineer's workflow. He declined to answer any questions about Google's planned acquisition. This Q&A has been edited for clarity and length. This is pretty much the same team between your first startup and Wiz? It is the same team, basically. The team is what makes the company and defines how it operates. It's not the specific direction or idea. When we left Microsoft, we didn't know what we wanted to build. We just said, 'We have a chance to get back together, so let's do it.' You started out with another service, right? We started in networking, then COVID hit, and no one wanted to talk about a future network architecture. It was all about, 'How can you help me now?' We had to pivot, but we like to pivot. That's the fun of startups — to find real problems, not the theoretical problems you think exist. Cloud security at the time was already a mature market. There were hundreds of solutions in the market. It's like when you go to a concert, the crowd is full, and you say, 'I got here too late, there's no way I can get close to the stage.' But in reality, none of the solutions actually solved the real problem. The market existed to help customers securely manage the cloud, but what companies actually needed was security for everything they had in the cloud. In the first year, we got to $14 million in annual recurring revenue, which was 10 times what we expected. Wiz grew as part of a mad dash of companies moving to the cloud. How does the disruption of the pandemic compare to what's happening now with artificial intelligence? We were remote first. We could hire any candidate we wanted. We could get any customer we wanted. This really helped us in the sense that the big companies had no advantage over us. The pandemic accelerated stuff. AI changes stuff. We must forget everything we've done until now and approach security very differently. The reason is simple: Everyone can build very fast. I'm talking a hundred times as fast as before. It's not just the number of applications increasing — it's the number of people in the company who can build stuff. The history of security in the enterprise was much more centralized. 'You want to build something? Come to me. I will tell you what to do.' That's approaching it like a building inspector. In today's world, a builder can "vibe code" something in one hour. And there are hundreds of developers to every one security person. The challenge for us is making security teams and developers work together when the business pushes them to move fast. Engineers clash with security. They say, 'I don't have time for it. I'll deal with it later.' Security is mission-critical to a company, and yet it's seen as second-class within engineering. It's second-class, but it's also boring. If you want to build an application, you think about how cool it will be. Are you thinking about security? We say security has to be democratized — self-service. We simplify the complexity so anyone can own security. If you build it, you have to own it. It doesn't scale any other way. We need to find a way as an industry to allow you to vibe code, but also vibe security while you do it. How do you do that? It has to be designed so it's easy to use. The iPhone was nice to use — it wasn't just about the features. You have to enable anyone to use the features that, before, you needed to be an expert. You probably see some of the same challenges with hiring— pitching talent to do boring, but impactful workHow has your pitch to candidates evolved through the years? I don't have to explain to technical people why cyber is cool. There's good and bad, and we are the people who find the problem before the bad guy comes. We're just five years old, although I admit there is a challenge around people saying, 'you're not a startup anymore.' I tell them, I'm forty-something. You decide if you're young or not. I feel like we're still a startup. What are you hearing from customers lately? I'm trying to cope with two different pressures. Some customers expect us to use AI to be smarter, and some are so afraid of the risks that they say in our contracts, 'do not use it at all.' We have a lot of discussions with customers. I try to tell them there's no way I can commit to that. There's a chance a support email will come, and a summary will run. We are a highly regulated entity, but we are also expected to run very fast. The challenge is: how can we leverage AI internally without putting data or customers at risk? I've read about how much code AI writes at Google or Microsoft, and it seems like showboating. We don't know the real impact on productivity yet, that's the truth. The amount of code being generated doesn't really mean that you can take away strong engineers from complex systems. We are starting to build different pipelines: an internal flow for employees and an external flow for the product. Support automation is a whole team we're now building that connects to sensitive systems and does very complex analysis. So, you accelerated during the pandemic. You're now riding the AI wave. Do you worry about an AI-native generation of cloud security startups coming to eat your lunch? Every company on the face of the earth feels there is a risk to its business. If they feel safe, they're probably even less safe. AI is only as smart as the data that you give it. Our advantage is that we understand your environment better than anyone. We are like Google Maps. You have a lot of layers: traffic, satellite, and businesses. You need all the layers to ask how long it is going to take me to get to the restaurant. We have all the layers. We understand the code, the network, the identity, the secrets, the applications, the malware, and the exposure. So we have the data. Now, for us, it's all about enabling the security teams to use the data in an AI-friendly way. Read the original article on Business Insider
