The global head of security intelligence at IBM Nick Coleman has called for cyber professionals to embrace the world of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and automation.

During the Isaca CSX Europe 2017 conference in London, Coleman said that without embracing the worlds of AI and automation, security execs will be “obsolete in three of four years.”

“The threats are becoming so serious that we need to embed artificial intelligence and automation into security processes so that we can be more intelligent and efficient in our response.

“We should be looking at each of these areas and finding ways to embed AI and automation wherever it makes sense to do so to improve efficiency, and thereby improve capability and, ultimately, enable greater business resilience,” Coleman said.

Coleman added that as the cyber security world becomes more sophisticated, the number of threats will continue, highlighting the need to automate as much as possible.

Commenting on IBM’s Watson super computer and the ability of it to ingest four million security-related documents an hour, Coleman added: ““Research shows that around a third of their time is spent gathering and processing information, but this is something that can be automated.

“We already have automated planes and ships, and relatively soon we will have self-driving cars, so they should be looking to where it makes most sense to automate in cyber security to make sure they are ready for the future and have developed the skills to deliver value on top of automation.”