As KubeCon + CloudNativeCon began its second day in Amsterdam, developers, engineers and IT leaders continued to explore emerging cloud-native and open-source technologies.

Hot topics at the conference include platform engineering, the evolving definition of DevOps, the rise of AI and the governance and ethics surrounding it.

“It’s open source. A lot of this stuff is unpaid, and folks are doing this because they want to see these projects moving forward,” said industry analyst Savannah Peterson (pictured, second from left). “This whole community is about community. If we’re going to see this evolution move forward, whether we’re talking about AI or Kubernetes or any of this stuff, it’s going to take some leaders … to step up into that role. We’re in unchartered waters.”

Peterson, along with analysts John Furrier (right), Joep Piscaer (left) and Rob Strechay (second from right), weighed in on breaking news coming out of this week’s KubeCon + CloudNativeCon Europe event, during an exclusive broadcast on theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s livestreaming studio. They discussed how the open-source ecosystem is maturing and why platform engineering is a real thing, as well as why the industry is about to get disrupted by artificial intelligence. (* Disclosure below.)

The rise and risks of AI

The rise of AI has been a significant talking point in the world of platform engineering, with many vendors and projects targeting this field. As the ecosystem matures and solutions become increasingly production-ready, the question remains: Does the tech community truly understand the implications of AI integration?

“The industry’s about to get disrupted by AI, and they have no idea what’s coming down the tracks,” Furrier said. “The AI surge is going to come, and I think that’s going to be a real wild card in the next year.”

One major area where AI is making an impact is in automation, particularly in observability, where the vast amount of data generated can be analyzed and modeled using AI. This progress, however, also raises concerns about security and data privacy, as incorporating AI into these systems can lead to blurred lines between public and private AI models.

“I’m a little worried about the governance and the ethics of what’s going on,” Peterson said. “The open-source community is perhaps one of the only gate checks that we’re going to have with this.”

As AI continues to disrupt the industry, its potential impact on security is becoming increasingly apparent. The integration of AI in various aspects of infrastructure and platform engineering will lead to new challenges and opportunities. In particular, the role of AI in automating and securing code written by bots and monitoring “code pollution” will be crucial to the evolution of the field, according to Furrier.

“Who’s going to watch the code that was written by bots and monitor that?” he asked. “I think observability is going to get turned upside down. It’s going to be kind of a shit show for a while.”

The analysts agreed that the ongoing collaboration and leadership within the open-source community will be essential to navigating the challenges posed by AI integration in platform engineering, security and automation.

Here’s the complete video interview, part of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s coverage of the KubeCon + CloudNativeCon Europe event:

(* Disclosure: This is an unsponsored editorial segment. However, theCUBE is a paid media partner for KubeCon + CloudNativeCon. Neither Red Hat Inc. nor other sponsors of theCUBE’s event coverage have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: SiliconANGLE