Effects of COVID-19 pandemic on computational intelligence and cybersecurity: survey

Abstract

In late December 2019, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced the outbreak of a new type of coronavirus, named the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), also known as COVID-19. The deadliness of the virus has forced governments and countries to socially isolate their populations, causing a worldwide impact on the economy. Pandemic management has stressed health systems to work beyond their limits, adding more to the tragedy of losing millions of lives. As a natural response to such disasters, intelligent systems have been developed for various reasons related to virus detection, tracking and control. The social lockdown created a record level of online platforms and applications being used to resume professional and educational activities in a virtual environment. This has triggered an unprecedented growth in cybercrime. This paper presents the effects of the pandemic on computational intelligence and cybersecurity.