Azerbaijan's cyber agency says AI puts major cyberattacks within reach of one person

Cyberattacks against Azerbaijan intensify whenever military tensions rise, and more than 3,000 were recorded in the run-up to the 44-Day War alone, Nadir Novruzov, a department head at Azerbaijan's State Service for Special Communications and Information Security (Xüsusi Rabitə və İnformasiya Təhlükəsizliyi üzrə Dövlət Xidməti), said at a panel during ADEX 2026 — the 6th Azerbaijan International Defence Exhibition — in Baku, Report.az reported on 2 October 2026. The site reported other remarks from the same panel, on the agency's work to draft AI-use rules for government bodies, on 4 October.

What the official said

• "Particularly during wartime, for example, on the eve of the 44-Day War, more than 3,000 cyberattacks were recorded by the State Service for Special Communications and Information Security, and we prevented them," Novruzov said, according to Report.az. He added that attacks also continued during the Tovuz operations, the April battles and later anti-terror operations.
• Artificial intelligence is reshaping both sides of the fight, he said: "If defenders can use artificial intelligence to organize their work, it also becomes an additional tool for attackers."
• Large-scale attacks once needed sizeable teams and long preparation, but "now, with artificial intelligence, one person can carry out cyberattacks capable of producing major results in a short period of time," Novruzov said.
• He called for continuous retraining of specialists — "we cannot respond to tomorrow's threats with yesterday's tools, so we must improve ourselves" — and for information-sharing through the Azerbaijan Cybersecurity Organizations Association (AKTA) and sectoral meetings.

Why it matters

The remarks come from the agency responsible for monitoring state information systems, and they put a specific number on a threat Azerbaijani officials have raised repeatedly in recent weeks: that artificial intelligence lowers the cost of mounting serious cyberattacks against government and corporate networks. Novruzov gave no attack figures for recent periods or a breakdown of AI-related incidents, so the 3,000-attack figure — tied specifically to the period before the 44-Day War — cannot be used to gauge today's attack volume.

What it means for Azerbaijani institutions

Novruzov's call to share threat data through AKTA and sectoral meetings points to the practical channel now open to Azerbaijani companies and state bodies, rather than a new rule or filing requirement. With preparation time for serious attacks shrinking, according to Novruzov, the near-term task he described for IT and security teams is tightening detection of automated, fast-moving intrusion attempts rather than relying on the longer, resource-heavy attack patterns defenders previously trained to spot.