I have to beg a revision to this analysis of AI as a solution to the InfoSec industry skills shortage. Point of fact, the skills shortage in cybersecurity is no longer about a lack of bodies performing any of the automated data mining and intrusion detection functions AI is currently able to do, and may advance further in years to come, but actually about human beings with the right skillset to do what AI can never do. We are looking at human beings who can not only intelligently leverage "tools" like AI, pentesting toolkits like Kali Linux, and the myriad hacking/cracking soft and hardware tools out there, but also to think like and counter Black Hat human threats with similar skillsets.<p>The Canadian Security Intelligence Service published an insightful paper "2018 Security Outlook - Potential Risks and Threats". In this paper they acknowledge that the skills shortage in cybersecurity will continue to be unsolved. In fact, they predict such a growth in automated tools with decision-making and other AI attributes and there is an embedded warning in this outlook that we can not blindly trust everything these systems produce. We need human beings as hackers, as analysts, as overseers of the AI armies predicted for 2017-2018 or we will lose control of the cyberwars we are currently managing.<p>To sell current and predicted AI tech as a solution to the security skills shortage is to suggest the problem is something other than it is. And if we suggest that, when AI is improved and proliferated, there will be a mistaken sense of comfort among some in the industry, and especially among those who are not "in the know" that will actually do more to threaten InfoSec as an industry, and the actual safety and security of our systems, in that it will create a vulnerability in the widening of the security skills hole - the human factor.<p>We love our tools, we love AI and we love technology. It will never be a solution to the ever-growing shortage in qualified human hackers desperately needed to fill seats in InfoSec roles across the needy customer base. All new tech needs human monitoring and if the AI as anticipated here comes to pass, you will need yet another large body of human assets to make it successful.