For the latest in our AI Tech Top Voice series, we sit down with Dmitri Vellikok, Head of Embedded Security at F-Secure, a global cybersecurity leader, trusted by consumers, telecommunications, and enterprise services in more than 100 countries. Dmitri has been with the company for over 16 years and has provided key support in the product strategy of F-Secure as it has moved from a threat detection-focused company to one that also provides embedded security and other high-value solutions.

Recommended: AITech Top Voice: Interview with Chon Tang, Founding Partner at SkyDeck Fund

Dmitri’s passion for technology and problem-solving goes back in his career to his consulting days in IT Infrastructure and website development. He became enamored with the idea of cybersecurity based on what he saw his peers as ethical hackers doing, and he knew that he wanted to protect, not exploit. Initially, he took an initial stint at IBM and then moved to F-Secure and has never looked back.

Dmitri currently has a team building integrated security tooling to combat the real-world threats of scam protection, identity monitoring, malware detection, etc. His breadth of experience in technical sales, product management, and working with partners has given him the ability to develop solutions that are not only technically capable but also engineer solutions that are fit for purpose for a rapidly changing threat landscape.

About Dmitri Vellikok: Dmitri Vellikok is the Head of Embedded Security at F-Secure. Dmitri brings more than 16 years of instrumental experience in cybersecurity, with experience in consulting, ethical hacking, product development, and global go-to-market strategy. 

About F-Secure:  F-Secure is a global cybersecurity leader headquartered in Finland. F-Secure has systematically innovated in cybersecurity for over 30 years, and delivers consumer and enterprise enendpointrotection, identity monitoring, scam protection, threat intelligence, and embedded security solutions. F-Secure works with leading telecom companies, OEMs & enterprises around the world to deliver frictionless, always-on digital safety. F-Secure is known for its deep knowledge in malware research and its award-winning technology that protects tens of millions of people from an ever-changing threat landscape every single day. 

Here’s the full interview.

AI Technology Insights (AIT): Hi, Dmitri, welcome to the AI Technology Top Voice Interview Series. Let’s get started.

AIT: What are F-Secure’s key offerings? How do you use AI and ML in your business?

Dmitri Vellikok: F-Secure provides consumer cybersecurity solutions that protect consumers from evolving digital threats. Our platform has integrated AI and machine learning for over a decade, but we’re constantly exploring new ways to leverage the latest technologies to combat threats. At the moment, the most exciting capabilities revolve around AI-enabled scams and deepfakes in various communication channels: texts, emails, social media, etc.

Our AI/ML initiatives span three key areas:

  • Protection: We use AI to enable our systems to focus on what humans excel at while letting machines handle activities that are beyond human scale and scope. This includes analyzing unstructured data like behavior patterns, predicting infections and attacks through internet traffic pattern analysis, and providing prescriptive recommendations through support chatbots and threat anticipation systems.
  • Marketing and Awareness: AI helps us tackle the challenge of generating market awareness through better segmentation, messaging, and content creation for digital marketing campaigns.
  • User Experience Adaptation: We’re leveraging AI to customize the user experience for individuals, optimizing for ease of use during setup, ongoing engagement, protection effectiveness, and minimizing performance impacts on the overall consumer experience.

AIT: We are celebrating AI Appreciation Day on 16 July. What message do you have for the AI industry, who have had ethics and data privacy concerns evolve in the last 2 years?

Dmitri Vellikok: My message to the AI industry is this: For all the good that AI can do for society, it can also be used nefariously. We cannot plan for one without thinking about the impacts of the other.

Over the past two years, we’ve seen a dramatic shift in the threat landscape. While traditional viruses and compromised devices remain concerns, we’re witnessing the rise of the “scam industry,” where AI technology has made fraudulent activities easier by reducing costs and increasing efficiency.

The challenge isn’t just technical – it’s about trust. As AI becomes more sophisticated, distinguishing between legitimate and malicious content becomes increasingly difficult. Since large language models aren’t perfect and do hallucinate, trust becomes crucial for AI adoption and security. How our industry evolves to combat this growing distrust will be crucial for the future of AI.

Ethics and data privacy concerns have evolved from theoretical discussions to practical, urgent challenges that directly impact consumer safety and trust in AI systems.

Specific example: as a consumer company, we have visibility into a lot of customer information to be able to protect them. The challenge is not the availability of the data to build better protection; the challenge is how this data can be used for protection. In many jurisdictions, the data is protected by law, and it’s not so much the technical challenge as a legal one.

Recommended: AITech Top Voice: Interview with Brian Fitzgerald, Growth Strategist at Augury

AIT: Tell us more about your AI initiatives in the US market. How are you planning to scale the AI research at F-Secure for the lagging industries when it comes to adoption and maturity?

Dmitri Vellikok: Our AI research is focused on making sure we can maximize AI’s protective capabilities within reasonable cost constraints for our partners and users. One of our biggest advantages is that AI enables us to protect against new scams that no one has seen before – this is particularly crucial as threat actors increasingly use AI to create more sophisticated attacks.

We’re blending F-Secure’s deep knowledge of scams and threat intelligence to tackle the challenge of detecting threats reliably without burning through excessive foundational model tokens and compute resources each time.

For industries lagging in AI adoption, our approach focuses on demonstrating practical, cost-effective applications rather than theoretical benefits. We’re developing solutions that can scale across different maturity levels, from basic threat detection to advanced predictive analytics that can assess individual risk profiles and the likelihood of being targeted.

AIT: How does the use of advanced AI and ML techniques protect users from online fraud, crypto scams, and identity theft? Any particular story you can share with us that reveals the power of how you’re using AI?

Dmitri Vellikok:

  • The threat landscape has fundamentally shifted. Antivirus technology, while still important, is no longer the primary frontier. Modern hardware and software designs have successfully mitigated many traditional malware risks. The real threat has moved to people – social engineering – and this trend will continue as the degrading information environment makes it harder for consumers, even security experts, to figure out what to trust.

The power of our AI approach lies in its predictive and prescriptive capabilities across multiple threat vectors:

  • Predictive Analytics: Beyond just detecting current threats, we’re developing systems that can predict the likelihood of someone becoming a target or victim through risk scoring and data analysis. This enables preventative measures rather than reactive responses.
  • Prescriptive and Educational Solutions: Our AI provides recommended actions through timely educational content, contextual news based on customer interests, and user experiences that customize protection based on individual risk profiles.

Recommended: AITech Top Voice: Interview with Tom Eggemeier, CEO at Zendesk

AIT: What are your predictions for the future of AI-powered antivirus technology? One F-Secure resource (whitepaper, ebook, or case study) that you would recommend every AI leader to refer to in 2025:

Dmitri Vellikok: We don’t typically make predictions about technology – that’s always risky – but I can share what we’re already observing:

We’re seeing the rise of scams both in scale and quality. More consumers are being impacted, even those who believe they can identify scams themselves. The methods are diversifying rapidly – from traditional emails to texts, social media, images, QR codes, and personalized video calls.

Looking ahead, we anticipate:

  • Virtual world scams and attacks on new device categories
  • Compromised Large Language Models (LLMs) providing deeper insights into individuals for blackmail or emotional manipulation
  • “Fake” LLMs designed specifically for malicious purposes

As sophistication grows, distinguishing scams from reality becomes nearly impossible, which will sow even more distrust. This creates a critical challenge: since trust is essential for AI adoption, how we as an industry address this growing skepticism will determine AI’s future success.

The future of AI-powered security won’t just be about better detection – it will be about rebuilding and maintaining trust in an increasingly complex digital environment.

AIT: Is there another person in your industry you respect who may also be useful to share in our AITech Top Voice interview series?

Dmitri Vellikok: One person whom I know firsthand who could add a meaningful perspective to this topic is Timo Laaksonen, the CEO of F-Secure. What sets Timo apart is his ability to balance a grounded, real-world understanding of the cyber threat landscape with a forward-looking vision for how AI can (and should) responsibly evolve to protect everyday consumers. He’s been at the forefront of navigating how AI intersects with ethics, privacy, and trust, especially in a time when technology is rapidly outpacing regulation and public understanding. Also, professionally, his insights can go well beyond cybersecurity, as they can speak to the broader role AI can and will play in preserving digital integrity in society.

Recommended: AITech Top Voice: Interview with Max Vermeir, Senior Director of AI Strategy at ABBYY

To share your insights, please write to us at sudipto@intentamplify.com