Artificial intelligence impacts drug design and cyber threat scales

Artificial intelligence is playing dual roles in advancing scientific research and complicating cybersecurity. In biotechnology, a study involving the AIntibody competition evaluated the efficacy of AI in designing therapeutic antibodies. Testing 511 AI-designed or selected antibodies against a SARS-CoV-2 protein, researchers found that AI was most effective at improving existing antibodies with useful properties. However, the technology proved less reliable when tasked with identifying the strongest candidates from groups or designing entirely new sequences from scratch.

In the realm of digital security, Interpol reports that AI is increasing the speed and scale of existing cyber threats rather than creating entirely new ones. Bjorn R. Watne, Interpol’s global chief information security officer, noted that AI enhances criminal tactics such as scams and fraud through improved translation and digital identity spoofing. Watne advised companies to prioritize protecting their most critical assets, or ‘crown jewels,’ and warned that the rise of agentic AI—which can take actions on behalf of users—introduces new risks.