On November 2nd, Masatoshi Kumagai, CEO of GMO Internet Group, spoke at a briefing on unauthorized access to Onanae.com Desktop Cloud, a VPS for automated FX trading provided by GMO Internet, a subsidiary of GMO Internet, where he explained the reasons for not paying ransom to attackers.
"We will not pay any money to criminals."
The briefing session consisted of three parts; in the first part, Kumagai and others apologized, and GMO Internet Vice President Hiroshi Yamashita and others explained the circumstances of the damage. ``Kumagai-bushi'' came to the fore in the second part of the talk, which was titled ``Explanation of the knowledge gained through this case.''
In Part 2, Mr. Kumagai talked about his knowledge of changes in the industry as a whole, and later in the Q&A session in Part 3, he explained that this information leak and the increase in AI-based cyber attacks are separate issues.
Mr. Kumagai talked about changes in cyber attacks due to the development of AI, and his remorse after receiving this unauthorized access. First, he talked about his 31 years of involvement in the Internet industry, and reflected on how his goal was to "make customers smile," and that he had always said that profit was the result, not the goal.
``In 31 years, I have never used the words ``profit'' or ``profit'' (Mr. Kumagai).
When asked about his thoughts since he entered the certification authority business 23 years ago, he tearfully said, ``I want the Internet to be safe and secure, contributing to the smiles of many people.''
Mr. Kumagai went on to talk about the speed at which AI is evolving, stating that the reason why news about information leaks appears every day is due to the "development of AI." He explained that since the U.S. OpenAI released ChatGPT on November 30, 2022, the speed of change in the Internet industry has gone through a quadratic curve and has become "vertical," describing it as "not progressing every day, but progressing by the second."
He cited ``AI developing AI'' as a reason for the dramatic change in the last six months. Compared to AI that operates 24 hours a day and can reproduce with a single command, he said, ``We have entered an era where humans are no longer an obstacle to speed.''
Mr. Kumagai pointed out that criminals were the first to adapt to this speed, complaining that criminals are using AI to ``threat your lives, businesses, and society.'' That's why he emphasized that ``we will not pay even an inch to criminals.'' He then declared, ``Their biggest goal is money. I will not do anything to encourage them.''
"This current social turmoil is only the prologue."
As an example of criminals using AI, Mr. Kumagai cited the cyber attack targeting financial institutions in South Korea and introduced the AI tool ARTEX used by the criminals.
It is a tool that allows you to switch between multiple AIs, and even if one AI refuses to respond, the next AI continues to search for weaknesses in the attack target.It is said that ``with a little knowledge, even a high school student can become a criminal, and if you are bad at it, even a middle school student'' can become a criminal. He expressed a sense of crisis, saying, ``The current social turmoil is only the prologue.''
“I intend to use this industry as a tool to bring smiles to many people before I die.”
At the end of his explanation, Mr. Kumagai mentioned his regrets about this time. For more than 10 years, the industry has had a concept of ``resilience,'' which means that it is impossible to prevent an intrusion, but to quickly stop it and recover, and the ``biggest problem'' was that the industry had been slow to become resilient. He said the company must change from a "security company to a resilience company."
Kumagai likened criminal attacks to ``previously a handgun, now a machine gun'' and emphasized that if society cannot keep up with this speed, ``the Internet will become unusable.'' Addressing reporters, he said, ``Please use the pen of your weapon to write down this fact,'' and emphasized his desire to encourage change so that people, businesses, and countries can adapt to this speed.
He denied that he had "the slightest intention" of changing the story of his failures, but said that at the age of 63, he has devoted half his life to the Internet.
``I want to clean this Internet as a treasure for people, for Japan, and for the world before I die,'' he said, and concluded, ``I will risk my life to make this industry a tool that brings smiles to many people before I die.''
