Japan's tech leaders team up to battle rising cyber threats

SoftBank is rolling out a new cybersecurity service using artificial intelligence from OpenAI to protect Japan's biggest businesses. The focus is on the top 3, 000 companies running critical systems like airports, power plants, and transport networks, which face growing dangers from hackers. SoftBank's CEO compares today's digital threats to old-school machine gun attacks, suggesting modern cybersecurity needs a complete upgrade from traditional defenses. The service works in two steps: first, it scans systems to find weak spots, then it suggests patches to fix those vulnerabilities. SoftBank's leader emphasized the urgency of this mission, calling the cyberattack situation a "crisis" that requires immediate action. Meanwhile, OpenAI's CEO couldn't attend the launch in person because of a family emergency, but he sent a video message instead. The event went on with OpenAI's research head present to explain the technology in more detail.

This partnership between the two tech giants started last year when they formed a 50-50 venture called SB OAI Japan. Their goal is to create AI tools specifically for the Japanese market, combining SoftBank's local expertise with OpenAI's advanced language models. The new service isn't just about diagnosis - it aims to stay ahead of cybercriminals by using AI that can adapt and learn from new attack methods. Cybercrime has become far more sophisticated recently, with attacks increasing in both number and complexity. Traditional security measures often fall short against these modern threats, making AI-powered solutions more important than ever. The companies aren't sharing any price tags for the service yet, but they're offering free security checks to attendees of Tuesday's presentation in Tokyo.

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