The 5G network is expected to bring about numerous benefits to organizations and enterprises once it is fully implemented, as it will connect a large number of devices at high speed, and offer ultralow latency and massive bandwidth.
Industries, such as healthcare, logistics, energy and power, ICT, and others will be leading adopters of the 5G network. 5G will drive smart city/smart nation, smart healthcare, logistics, smart factories, and smart transportation initiatives. Enterprises will embrace 5G to make the most of IoT, cloud, Big Data, and AI which will drive their transformation journeys. 5G will complement these technologies and gradually replace other costly conventional network services.
As 5G becomes more popular, the adoption rate of 5G-enabled SD-WAN and mesh networks will increase significantly. 5G also presents more security risks, as criminals may be able to exploit flaws in the 5G network, such as virtualization vulnerability. As 5G connects numerous devices, from conventional devices used in enterprises to IoT devices used in OT and commercial environments, the potential attack surface expands.
Compromised IoT-based DDoS attacks and other attacks that exploit endpoint/device application vulnerabilities are expected to increase. To tackle 5G-related security challenges, businesses and network operators will adopt a shared security model, similar to public cloud security. DDoS protection is likely to become the most important component of 5G security, as the number of devices connecting to a network grows each day.
As these devices are often vulnerable to exploitative attacks, organizations will have to invest more in vulnerability management capabilities to prevent volumetric DDoS attacks. A conventional security approach may not offer adequate protection when bandwidth usage increases. Therefore, organizations will seek scalable and automated security solutions with AI-/ML-powered threat detection-and-response capabilities.
