Security responders are suffering burnout as AI-driven cyberattacks pour in.

Axios reported on Oct. 30 that frontline security staff are facing attacks, vulnerabilities and false-positive alerts all at once, putting them in a difficult situation.

They must comb through vast threat data to determine which companies were hit and which attacks are truly dangerous.

Justin Timothy (저스틴 티모시), a threat intelligence consultant at GuidePoint Security, said, "The past month felt like the longest year of my life."

Troy Bettencourt (트로이 베텐코트), head of digital forensics and incident response at Palo Alto Networks, said demand for response services rose by double digits over the past six weeks. Axios reported that, unlike past periods of surging cyberattacks such as the SolarWinds incident, work has kept piling up without pause this year and investigations once handled by 1 person now require 5 to 20 people.

Samantha Lewis (사만다 루이스), head of threat intelligence at Amadina, also said customers are flooding the company with requests to check whether they are exposed to internet-based code flaws found by AI. Lewis' team reviewed hundreds of attack codes over several days, and many did not work. Lewis said, "The level of staffing needed to stop this is becoming unmanageable."

Palo Alto Networks is shifting staff from other projects into incident response to prepare for attacks exploiting a PHP vulnerability disclosed last week.

Security firms are using AI and automation to speed up vulnerability detection and investigations. Bettencourt said, "Employees are exhausted but are hearing that AI is taking jobs," adding, "It is hard to strike a balance."

Companies with limited damage are not exempt. Jack Nelson (잭 넬슨), chief information security officer at Ivanti, said, "I slept less than usual last week" even though exposure to the PHP vulnerability was limited.