Who Will Protect Our Money in an AI Cyberwar?

The next cyberattack could pit artificial intelligence against artificial intelligence, with one system searching for a way in while another works to block it. That prospect raises a pressing question for anyone whose money depends on digital security: who is ultimately responsible for keeping it safe?

In this scenario, an attacker would not need to sit at a screen directing every move. An AI system could look for a vulnerability and develop a way to exploit it, taking on tasks that would otherwise require human intervention.

On the defensive side, another AI system could detect the attack and close off its route before a security employee has to act. The contest would become a race between automated systems seeking weaknesses and those trying to contain them.

For institutions entrusted with money, the challenge is not simply whether to use AI. It is how to ensure that automated protection remains reliable when an adversary can use similar technology to find a way around it.

Human oversight remains central to that question. Even if machines carry out the attack and the response, responsibility for protecting funds—and deciding what happens when those protections fail—cannot simply be handed to an algorithm.