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By SecureWorld News Team
Mon | Sep 11, 2017 | 2:08 PM PDT

There's no better person to discuss actionable intelligence and the need for a national cyber policy than Colonel Cedric Leighton.

Leighton is a retired US Air Force extraordinaire, who served at US Special Operations Command, the NSA, training today's cyber warriors. He is currently a regular military analyst for CNN, and will be keynoting at SecureWorld St. Louis on September 20th.

His topic, “Artificial Intelligence, Real Intelligence, and the Need for a Coherent National Cyber Policy,” will cover the current US cyber front, and the need to push ourselves to do more.

"We’re entering a brave new world in which AI will become a key component not only in computing, but in our daily lives," says Leighton. "We have to use our native—or 'real'—intelligence to determine, as a society, where we want this journey to take us." 

"There are some real potential pitfalls out there, and it’s important for us to develop the right policy prescriptions to deal with the social, legal, and economic consequences of the increased use of AI as part of our daily routines," he adds.

As the frequency and cost of a data breach continues to rise, we can't afford to sit back and just watch what happens.

"If we don’t work on this now, we risk severe social and economic dislocation. We also risk increasing our cyber vulnerabilities dramatically as our cyber attack surfaces grow exponentially in the next few years," says Leighton.

After all, artificial intelligence and certainly the Internet of Things is here to stay. And we need to be ready to defend ourselves, should something be compromised.

Leighton says, "I see AI as an integral part of the Internet of Things. True IoT won’t happen without a well-developed AI component. Because IoT and AI are both natural progressions in the evolution of our computing capabilities, it becomes important for us to guide the development of AI so it serves humankind. We don’t want to become slaves to AI. That has too much potential to be a nightmare scenario."

To hear Leighton speak on cyber intelligence and the need for a cohesive plan, register now for SecureWorld St. Louis. You can also view the complete agenda here.

Tags: Cybersecurity,
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