A Systematic Review of the Role of Artificial Intelligence in Cybersecurity

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has become a cornerstone in advancing cybersecurity, offering innovative solutions to detect and mitigate cyber threats. Over the past decade, numerous studies have explored the application of AI, particularly machine learning (ML) and deep learning (DL), in enhancing cybersecurity across various domains such as intrusion detection, malware identification, and phishing prevention. This paper presents a systematic review of AI applications in cybersecurity, covering the period from 2014 to August 2024. The review analyzed literature from five major academic databases—Google Scholar, MDPI, Science Direct, Springer, and IEEE—with a focus on only review papers to gain comprehensive insights into the field. The findings reveal significant progress in deploying AI to counter cyber threats, with notable advances in AI-driven threat intelligence, incident response, and the identification of adversarial ML challenges. However, the review also highlights persistent challenges, including the need for high-quality training datasets, the complexities of emerging threats, and the ethical considerations surrounding AI deployment in cybersecurity.