CrowdStrike Holdings Inc. and Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. today announced startup acquisitions designed to bolster their artificial intelligence security capabilities.

CrowdStrike is buying Pangea Inc., which helps companies monitor how employees interact with external AI tools. Its software can also secure internal AI workloads. Check Point, in turn, has agreed to acquire a startup called Lakera Inc. that offers two cybersecurity tools with similar features.

The Wall Street Journal reported today that CrowdStrike is paying about $260 million for Pangea. The deal represents a significant return for the startup’s investors. Before the acquisition, it had raised about $27 million in funding from Alphabet Inc.’s GV fund, Okta Ventures and other institutional backers.

Pangea provides a platform that helps enterprises monitor how workers use third-party AI services. It can identify the applications that employees access and determine which AI models power those applications. Additionally, it can scan employees’ prompts for cybersecurity risks.

According to Pangea, its platform collects data on AI usage via a browser extension and an application called the AI Gateway. The latter tool doubles as a data leak prevention mechanism. It analyzes employees’ AI prompts and removes any sensitive business information they may contain. Additionally, it can scan AI applications’ prompt responses for malicious content.

The other focus of Pangea’s platform is helping companies secure their own AI applications. The software can filter malicious prompts designed to trick applications into leaking sensitive data. It also blocks other malicious activity, such as attempts to introduce vulnerabilities into an AI model.

CrowdStrike plans to integrate Pangea’s technology into its flagship Falcon cybersecurity platform. According to the company, the technology will enable customers to block up to 99% of the malicious prompts sent to their applications with latency of under 30 milliseconds.

“CrowdStrike protects the foundation: endpoints, cloud workloads, data, identities, and AI models,” CrowdStrike President Michael Sentonas wrote in a blog post. “Pangea secures the interactions: prompts, responses, and agent communications.”

Lakera, the other AI cybersecurity provider that was acquired today, raised about $31 million prior to its sale. It counts Dropbox Inc. as an investor. Check Point didn’t disclose the financial terms of the acquisition. 

The company has developed a tool Lakera Guard that can protect AI applications from malicious prompts. It’s designed to block many of the same threats as Pangea’s platform. It also offers a second product, Lakera Red, that uses an AI agent to automatically scan AI applications for vulnerabilities. It then ranks those vulnerabilities based on their severity.

Check Point will use Lakera’s technology to extend the capabilities of its existing GenAI Protect security tool. The offering enables companies to identify what AI applications have been adopted by their employees and track how they’re used.

Lakera maintains engineering centers in San Francisco and Zurich. After the deal closes, the company will become the “foundation of Check Point’s Global Center of Excellence for AI Security.” The hub is tasked with developing features for the company’s Infinity suite of cybersecurity products. 

Photo: CrowdStrike