The growth of artificial intelligence (AI) as an analytical or defensive tool in the cyber professional’s arsenal appears to be having a significant impact on workplace stress, but the security workforce is divided on whether or not AI is elevating stress levels, or lowering them.
This is according to a new study from cyber pro industry association ISC2, titled Rethinking AI’s Impact on Cybersecurity Roles, which reveals the extent to which AI is reshaping the nature of security work. In particular, the study found, while AI is improving efficiency and enabling security teams to work more strategically, it is brining new risks, increasing pressures, and having a significant effect on early career pathways.
“AI is not replacing cyber security professionals; it is changing what the profession requires of them,” said ISC2 CEO Scott Beale. “As AI takes on more repetitive tasks, as well as performing some complex cyber security analysis at speed and scale, cyber security roles are shifting toward higher-value work, from asking the right questions to validating findings, interpreting outputs and applying human judgment.
“This evolution is not limited to entry-level roles. It changes how work is distributed across security teams, making continued investment in governance, validation practices, mentoring and skills development essential at every level,” said Beale.
When it came to stress, a perennial occupational health hazard among cyber security workers, 48% of respondents to ISC2’s study said AI had reduced workplace stress, but 32% said it had increased it.
The split into two distinct camps appears to reflect the nature of the work that people are being asked to do. Those who said they were experiencing more stress following the introduction of AI-enabled workflows were much more likely to spend more time deciding when to trust AI-generated recommendations, or when reviewing or validating AI model outputs.
ISC2 also found a strong correlation between those who were experiencing higher stress levels and concern over the impact of AI in cyber security systems. Those who were more worried about how to explain or justify AI-related decisions, accountability for outcomes influenced by AI, reduced human judgment at critical decision points, undetected AI issues causing cascading failures, and overreliance on AI recommendations were all more stressed.
ISC2 noted accountability concerns as particularly high impact in this regard. Many respondents reported that when AI-recommended actions lead to incorrect or outright damaging outcomes, organisations tend to hold human decision-makers accountable, and 90% of respondents said they had found themselves in a situation where an AI had given them guidance that turned out to be incorrect.
Conversely, those cyber pros who claimed AI was decreasing their stress levels tended to be those whose roles were – perhaps ironically – becoming more hands-off as a result. Security workers who spent less time performing hands-on tasks and less time overseeing cyber systems or procedures since the introduction of AI were more likely to say they felt more at ease.
Jobs for the grads
The ISC2 research also reignites the conversation over the longstanding cyber skills shortage and the need to do better at promoting security as a career option among young people, with evidence that AI is now changing the nature of early-career pathways in the cyber sector, and not necessarily in a positive way.
Indeed, just under 60% of study participants said they felt that AI was reducing the need for entry-level roles, 38% significantly so, compared to just 4% who thought AI was significantly increasing the need for entry-level cyber professionals.
Just over half of participants – 53% in all – said they thought that AI was creating new types of entry-level security roles. However, the report did not reveal what the precise nature of these new roles actually was, or how those performing them felt about them.
But this said, 48% of respondents said they felt AI was making them more optimistic about their long-term prospects in the security sector, and 62% said that even though AI is changing the nature of the role, the need for foundational cyber security skills is still as pressing as ever.
