AI-Driven Cybersecurity and Organizational Cyber Resilience: The Role of Intelligent Threat Detection

Abstract

This study used a quantitative research design with a survey approach to explore the relationship between the use of AI in cybersecurity, intelligent threat detection and the organizational cyber-resilience. A purposive sampling technique was used to gather data from cybersecurity professionals, IT managers, network administrators, and information security specialists in organisations with a technology focus, by administering a structured questionnaire. The collected answers were processed by means of Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) and the reliability and validity of measurement were tested by conducting Cronbach's alpha, composite reliability, convergent and discriminant validity tests. Path analysis was applied to assess hypothesized relationships between AI-driven cybersecurity, intelligent threat detection and cyber resilience, and bootstrapping was employed to identify the significance of the proposed effects. Results revealed that AI-driven cybersecurity practices were positively and significantly linked with intelligent threat detection, which was positively and significantly linked with organizational cyber resilience, and that intelligent threat detection was a significant mediator of the link between AI-driven cybersecurity practices and cyber resilience. The measurement model exhibited good reliability and validity while the structural model had acceptable fit to the data. The study finds that AI investments towards cyber security are linked to the organization's cyber security outcomes mainly through their capacity to enhance the intelligent detection capability, and not directly, which highlights the critical role of the detection capability as an instrument that connects AI investments to the outcomes of cyber security outcomes.