Unpacking Cisco AI Defense: Its Implications for Customers and the Company

Cisco Systems Inc. this week saw the inaugural AI Summit, a leadership event addressing key issues shaping the future of artificial intelligence, with a focus on the security of AI systems.

The summit was small and private, attended by about 150 people, including executives from approximately 40 Fortune 100 companies. I can see why the interest from top companies was so high, as the list of speakers was impressive and included AI luminaries such as Alexander Wang, founder and executive director Scale AI Inc.; Jonathan Ross, Founder and CEO Groq Inc.; Aaron Levy, Co-Founder and CEO Box Inc.; Brad Lightcap, Chief Operating Officer OpenAI; David Solomon, CEO Goldman Sachs; and many others.

On the product side, Cisco used the AI ​​Summit to announce a new tool called Cisco AI Protectionwhich, as the name suggests, protects AI systems. According to 2024 Cisco AI Readiness Indexonly 29% of organizations feel prepared to stop hackers or unauthorized users from accessing their AI systems. AI Defense aims to change that statistic.

The product launch is timely as AI security is now at the forefront of business and IT professionals. I also visited this week National Retail Federation show in New York. I attended three CIO events there, with a total of about 50 CIOs in attendance.

Every IT manager at the three events was very interested in AI. The main factor holding most of them back was security, especially for regulated industries such as healthcare, retail and financial services.

Cisco AI Protection is designed to give security teams a clear view of all AI applications employees are using and whether they are authorized. For example, the tool offers a comprehensive overview of shadow AI and sanctioned AI applications. It implements policies that limit employee access to unauthorized applications while ensuring compliance with privacy and security regulations.

One common theme in my IT discussions is that no one wants to be the “department of no,” but they also understand that without proper controls, the use of AI can put the business at risk. Also, it has been shown over time that when IT departments say no, users find a way around it. It’s better to give users options, and Cisco AI Defense offers the visibility and controls needed to keep workers safe.

The tool is also useful for developers, as applications can be protected at every stage of the application lifecycle. During development, it identifies weaknesses in AI models so that potential problems can be fixed at an early stage. This helps developers to create secure applications immediately without worrying about hidden risks.

When it comes time to deploy these applications, AI Defense ensures that they run securely in the real world. It constantly monitors unauthorized access, data leakage and cyber threats. The tool ensures continuous security even after the application is deployed by detecting new risks.

One of the unique attributes of the tool is its constant validation at scale. One of the challenges with security AI is that while a company can use traditional tools to secure the environment at any point, the fences will have to adapt if the model changes. Cisco AI Defense uses threat analysis from Cisco Talos and machine learning to continuously scan the environment and automate tool updates.

It also builds on Cisco’s security portfolio, which is shaping up nicely as a platform. In an analyst Q&A, I asked Cisco Chief Product Officer Jetha Patel (pictured left with Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins) about the “1+1=3” effect if you use AI Defense with Hypershield. He corrected me and said that the four technologies created “1+1+1+1=20”. These include Cisco Secure Access, Hypershield, Multi-Cloud Defense, and AI Defense.

“These four work in concert,” Patel said. “If you need visibility into the public cloud or running applications, Multi-Cloud Defense connects with AI Defense and provides you with the data you need to protect your environment. If you want to enforce on a rack-top switch or server with an EBPF agent, this can happen because AI Defense is built into Hypershield.”

Moreover, he added, “we will cooperate with third parties and are ready to combine it with competitors’ products. We understand that the real enemy is the adversary, not just another security company, and we want to ensure an ecosystem effect across the industry.”

DJ Sampath, Cisco’s vice president of AI products, software and platforms, added: “AI Defense’s data will be integrated into Splunk, so all the things demonstrated will go into Splunk through Cisco add-on to enrich the alerts you see in Splunk.” Given the price Cisco paid for Splunk Inc., integrating more Cisco products and data into it will create a revenue multiplier.

I strongly believe that stock changes happen when the market changes, and AI security presents an incredible opportunity for Cisco and its peers. AI will create a wave of development in the security industry, but the company that can handle it easily will benefit disproportionately. The vision that Cisco has laid out is impressive, but the proof will come when the product becomes available. We won’t have to wait long as it is expected to be available this March.

For those who missed it the event will be rebroadcast next Wednesday, January 22.

Zeus Kerravala is a principal analyst at ZK Research, a division of Kerravala Consulting. He wrote this article for SiliconANGLE.

Photo: Zeus Kerravala