CYBERSECURITY: How one hacker used AI agents and a few thousand dollars to break into scores of sites.

Over the past couple of weeks, a cybersecurity researcher watched as a Chinese-speaking hacker broke into websites belonging to more than 100 companies, including farm equipment maker Deere, home appliance ​company SharkNinja, and engine manufacturer Cummins.

Yet the hacker did almost none of the work.

The cybercriminal instead outsourced the hacking spree almost entirely to artificial intelligence, tasking AI agents ‌with spending hours autonomously probing and breaking into targeted sites, according to Snorre Fagerland, principal threat researcher at the cybersecurity company NorForge.

In a report provided to Reuters ahead of publication on Monday, opens new tab, Fagerland said the hacker was one of several he discovered while scanning the web for inadvertently exposed instances of Cairn, an open-source AI problem-solving platform popular with hackers.

Where are the counter-intrusion bots?