Protect AI
Security platform for the ML supply chain
Overview
Protect AI scans ML models and pipelines for vulnerabilities — malicious pickle files, supply-chain attacks via model hubs, prompt-injection patterns. Acquired several open-source security tools (NB Defense, ModelScan). Enterprise focus.
Use cases
What you can produce with Protect AI
- Scan a model file downloaded from Hugging Face or another hub for malicious payloads — such as code hidden in pickle serialisation — before allowing it into your environment, across 35+ model formats.
- Enforce organisation-wide model security policies at a gateway, automatically blocking models that fail scans from reaching production pipelines.
- Run automated red-teaming against a deployed LLM application with Recon to surface prompt-injection, jailbreak and data-leakage weaknesses before attackers do.
- Use the free open-source ModelScan tool (Apache 2.0) to check model artifacts for unsafe serialisation in CI pipelines.
- Continuously monitor AI applications at runtime for attacks and anomalous behaviour through the Layer capability now folded into Prisma AIRS.
- Build an inventory of every model, dataset and AI component in use across the organisation so security teams can see their full AI attack surface.
- Draw on threat intelligence from the huntr community of thousands of AI/ML security researchers to stay ahead of newly discovered model-format exploits.
ASEAN Perspective
Protect AI in Southeast Asia
ASEAN-region availability and pricing notes coming soon. Drop the editorial team a note via /contact/ if you can supply local context (Singapore/Malaysia/Indonesia/Thailand/Vietnam).
Protect AI was a leading AI/ML security company offering model scanning, AI security posture management, AI red-teaming and runtime protection across the ML lifecycle, and a strong contributor to the open-source ML supply-chain security ecosystem. Palo Alto Networks completed its acquisition in July 2025, making Protect AI's technology a cornerstone of Prisma AIRS, Palo Alto's comprehensive AI security platform.
It suits enterprises securing AI/ML pipelines, model supply chains and agentic systems, now best evaluated as part of Prisma AIRS rather than as a standalone product. Caveats: the standalone Protect AI brand and pricing are being subsumed into Palo Alto's portfolio, so buyers should expect platform-bundled procurement and a transition period for roadmap and product names. ASEAN readiness benefits from Palo Alto's deep regional enterprise presence and channel, though engagement is enterprise sales-led with no self-serve entry.
What people say
Protect AI no longer operates as an independent company: Palo Alto Networks announced its intent to acquire the Seattle-based startup on April 28, 2025 and completed the deal on July 22, 2025, with SEC filings putting total consideration at about $634.5 million. Its technology and team became the cornerstone of Prisma AIRS, Palo Alto's AI security platform, where Protect AI's model-scanning, red-teaming (Recon) and runtime-monitoring capabilities now live alongside Palo Alto's own runtime security. Anyone evaluating "Protect AI" today is really evaluating Prisma AIRS, which carries around 33 reviews on Gartner Peer Insights.
Before and through the acquisition, Protect AI earned genuine respect among ML security practitioners for depth rather than breadth. Its Guardian gateway scans machine-learning model files across 35+ formats — pickle, PyTorch, TensorFlow, ONNX, GGUF and more — for malicious payloads before they reach production, and the company reported scanning over four million models on Hugging Face. Its open-source roots also earned goodwill: ModelScan remains freely available under Apache 2.0, and the huntr bug-bounty community it ran mobilised thousands of security researchers to find vulnerabilities in ML tooling, feeding threat intelligence back into the commercial product.
The trade-offs are those typical of a startup absorbed into a large vendor. The standalone brand and roadmap are gone; buying the capabilities now generally means engaging with Palo Alto Networks enterprise sales and, realistically, getting the most value if you are invested in its ecosystem. Independent analyses of the MLSecOps space still rate the underlying technology highly against rivals like HiddenLayer, but pricing transparency and lightweight adoption paths have narrowed.
The fit is clear: enterprises with meaningful ML supply-chain exposure — teams pulling models from public hubs, running MLOps pipelines, or deploying agents — that want scanning, red-teaming and runtime defence from one vendor, especially existing Palo Alto customers consolidating on Prisma AIRS.
Summary of public user & expert reviews, compiled by RECATOOLS.
About this listing
This entry was compiled from publicly available data including Protect AI's official website, press releases, documentation, and reputable third-party publications. RECATOOLS is not affiliated with Protect AI unless explicitly stated.
Third-party AI tools update their pricing, features, availability, and policies frequently. Information here may be outdated by the time you read this — we make reasonable efforts to keep listings current, but cannot guarantee absolute accuracy.
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