The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) will arguably benefit many ASX shares. But there's one ASX exchange-traded fund (ETF) that might be first in line to rake in some of AI's transformative upside.
The BetaShares Global Cybersecurity ETF (ASX: HACK) is a popular choice for many ASX investors. It's an ETF that specialises in providing exposure to the cybersecurity industry, and the most important players within it.
But it could also be poised to prosper from the rise of AI.
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ASX ETF to benefit from the rise of AI cyberattacks
A recent report from NBC revealed the rising use of AI tools like ChatGPT by hackers to produce fraudulent emails, cyberattacks and criminal schemes.
The report quotes the United States National Security Agency (NSA)'s director Rob Joyce, who stated the following:
We already see criminal and nation-state elements utilizing AI," he said. "We're seeing intelligence operators, we're seeing criminals on those platforms… One of the first things they're doing is they're just generating better English-language outreach to their victims, whether it's phishing emails or something much more elaborative in the case of malign influence.
However, Joyce also argued that AI technology is being employed to help defend against cyberattacks and hacking. The NSA has recently announced the creation of an AI Security Centre to promote the "secure adoption of new AI capabilities" across the cybersecurity world.
Joyce stated that "AI machine learning, deep learning, is absolutely making us better at finding malicious activity. It is helping us see things illuminated so it stands out from the norm".
And that brings us back to the BetaShares Global Cybersecurity ETF. This ETF holds many companies that are at the forefront of the fight against cybercrime. These include Broadcom, Crowdstrike, Palo Alto, Okta and Zscaler.
To illustrate, access management stock Okta is currently developing Okta AI. Using Okta AI can reportedly lead to a 90% reduction in bot activities over 90 days.
Another cybersecurity stock, Crowdstrike, is also harnessing the power of AI to "detect the most advanced threats while minimizing false positives". The company's "world-class AI" is reportedly "trained on trillions of security events from a variety of platforms".
So while the rise of AI has led to new challenges in the cybersecurity front, it is also opening up new solutions in the fight against online illegal activity. And this ETF can help investors get a slice of the action.
