Cybersecurity and the Gap Between Skill and Ability

National security agencies from the Five Eyes (the English-speaking allies: US, UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand) warned that AI models can now autonomously hack into systems and networks, expanding what untrained people can do with minimal skill. The core problem is that AI has decoupled skill from ability: whereas hacking once required deep technical knowledge, AI tools now let anyone with little expertise cause major damage through attacks like data theft, ransomware (malicious software that locks files until payment is made), and system destruction. The text suggests that defending against this will require using AI itself for protection, but notes that open-source models (AI code anyone can download and run locally) lack safety guardrails and will spread like earlier hacker tools.