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The ability of generative AI to imitate music artists like Drake and Grimes made headlines this week as did news that large corporates like PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) and Walmart are putting the technology to use for more pragmatic purposes – tax preparation and haggling with suppliers – an indication of how quickly the technology is being embraced by big business.

PwC said it plans to invest $1 billion in generative artificial intelligence technology in its U.S. operations over the next three years, working with Microsoft. and ChatGPT-maker OpenAI to automate aspects of its tax, audit and consulting services, according to The Wall Street Journal.

“This is about using generative AI to run the company in a more efficient way,” Mohamed Kande, PwC’s vice chair and co-leader of U.S. consulting solutions and global advisory leader, told the Wall Street Journal. “Embracing this technology is critical.”
Bloomberg reported this week on how Walmart has partnered with Microsoft, OpenAI and Pactum AI to introduce conversational AI tools across its business units, including procurement. Meanwhile, Reuters described how lawyers are increasingly using generative AI tools as co-counsels and an April 25 academic study outlined how generative AI-based conversational assistants are fueling productivity gains.

In September 2020 a Russian-speaking cyber espionage gang called Nomadic Octopus singled out Tajikistan’s government and its public service infrastructure. The point of initial access was through the Central Asian country’s national telephone operator, according to Prodaft, the cyber threat intelligence company that discovered the breach.

While it is still not clear how the gang broke into the telephone company, once it got inside it began to perform reconnaissance on the phone network and its customers and affiliates.

Using stolen client contracts and credentials, weak network security configurations and exploitation of not up-to-date software and services, the gang leveraged this initial entry point to hack the devices of government officials and business executives belonging to at least 18 ultimate targets.

The insidious operation, code-named Paperbug, allowed the gang to spy on targets for almost two years. Back doors it installed on victims' devices allowed Nomadic Octopus to not only watch victims write emails and create new contracts for customers but capture the information by secretly taking screenshots, running commands remotely and downloading and uploading files.

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Zero Systems is on a mission is to offer every knowledge worker a co-pilot powered by Large Language Models (LLMs) and Generative AI. The San Francisco-based company is targeting Fortune 1000 companies and says it has 30 large clients including American consulting firm Mercer and global law firm Dentons.

Many companies across industries are interested in leveraging LLMs and ChatGPT-like models in their business operations, but they have concerns regarding data privacy and security, model accuracy and reliability, computational cost, and a lack of skilled engineers.

“If you want companies to put this to real use and get real ROI then the orchestration and automation layer we offer needs to be put in place,” says CEO Alex Babin, a serial founder and seasoned CEO with over 20 years of experience in automotive, SaaS and AI.

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Projected spending across all sectors in the global generative AI market by the end of this year, growing at a compound annual rate of 32% to $98.1 billion by 2026, according to Pitchbook Data, a market analytics firm.