AI Guardian and the Data-First Security Approach
Cyera's newly launched AI Guardian represents the company's evolution from data intelligence to comprehensive AI security. The product addresses a fundamental challenge that Ash Hunt identifies from his experience as a Global CISO: organizations have historically struggled to solve for data and identity security, which he describes as 'orphan security programs.' With AI now consuming both data and identity at unprecedented scale, AI Guardian provides posture management to help organizations understand what AI exists across their environment—including shadow AI engaged by end users—and how data flows through models and agents. The platform monitors data usage and identity access in real time, addressing risks from data leakage to malicious prompts.
Combining Posture Management with Runtime Protection
Hunt emphasizes that effective AI security requires both posture management and runtime protection working in tandem. Using the analogy of tuning a piano blind, he explains that organizations often have only approximate knowledge of where their data resides, its classification, encryption status, and access controls. Cyera's approach uses AI to solve these discovery challenges, revealing what Hunt calls 'the unknown unknown'—exposures that organizations didn't realize existed. This foundational posture understanding then enables meaningful runtime protection, tracking how identities access data, how models manipulate it, and how outputs are used across the organization. The company applies advanced LLMs to achieve both speed and precision across data estates without sacrificing fidelity.
