HiddenLayer in the News

On September 30, Databricks officially launched its Data Intelligence Platform for Cybersecurity, marking a significant step in unifying data, AI, and security under one roof. At HiddenLayer, we’re proud to be part of this new data intelligence platform, as it represents a significant milestone in the industry's direction.

Why Databricks’ Data Intelligence Platform for Cybersecurity Matters for AI Security

Cybersecurity and AI are now inseparable. Modern defenses rely heavily on machine learning models, but that also introduces new attack surfaces. Models can be compromised through adversarial inputs, data poisoning, or theft. These attacks can result in missed fraud detection, compliance failures, and disrupted operations.

Until now, data platforms and security tools have operated mainly in silos, creating complexity and risk.

The Databricks Data Intelligence Platform for Cybersecurity is a unified, AI-powered, and ecosystem-driven platform that empowers partners and customers to modernize security operations, accelerate innovation, and unlock new value at scale.

How HiddenLayer Secures AI Applications Inside Databricks

HiddenLayer adds the critical layer of security for AI models themselves. Our technology scans and monitors machine learning models for vulnerabilities, detects adversarial manipulation, and ensures models remain trustworthy throughout their lifecycle.

By integrating with Databricks Unity Catalog, we make AI application security seamless, auditable, and compliant with emerging governance requirements. This empowers organizations to demonstrate due diligence while accelerating the safe adoption of AI.

The Future of Secure AI Adoption with Databricks and HiddenLayer

The Databricks Data Intelligence Platform for Cybersecurity marks a turning point in how organizations must approach the intersection of AI, data, and defense. HiddenLayer ensures the AI applications at the heart of these systems remain safe, auditable, and resilient against attack.

As adversaries grow more sophisticated and regulators demand greater transparency, securing AI is an immediate necessity. By embedding HiddenLayer directly into the Databricks ecosystem, enterprises gain the assurance that they can innovate with AI while maintaining trust, compliance, and control.

In short, the future of cybersecurity will not be built solely on data or AI, but on the secure integration of both. Together, Databricks and HiddenLayer are making that future possible.

FAQ: Databricks and HiddenLayer AI Security

What is the Databricks Data Intelligence Platform for Cybersecurity?
The Databricks Data Intelligence Platform for Cybersecurity delivers the only unified, AI-powered, and ecosystem-driven platform that empowers partners and customers to modernize security operations, accelerate innovation, and unlock new value at scale.

Why is AI application security important?
AI applications and their underlying models can be attacked through adversarial inputs, data poisoning, or theft. Securing models reduces risks of fraud, compliance violations, and operational disruption.

How does HiddenLayer integrate with Databricks?
HiddenLayer integrates with Databricks Unity Catalog to scan models for vulnerabilities, monitor for adversarial manipulation, and ensure compliance with AI governance requirements.

AUSTIN, TX — July 16, 2025 — HiddenLayer, the leading provider of security solutions for artificial intelligence, is proud to announce the appointment of Chelsea Strong as Chief Revenue Officer (CRO). With over 25 years of experience driving enterprise sales and business development across the cybersecurity and technology landscape, Strong brings a proven track record of scaling revenue operations in high-growth environments.

As CRO, Strong will lead HiddenLayer’s global sales strategy, customer success, and go-to-market execution as the company continues to meet surging demand for AI/ML security solutions across industries. Her appointment signals HiddenLayer’s continued commitment to building a world-class executive team with deep experience in navigating rapid expansion while staying focused on customer success.

“Chelsea brings a rare combination of startup precision and enterprise scale,” said Chris Sestito, CEO and Co-Founder of HiddenLayer. “She’s not only built and led high-performing teams at some of the industry’s most innovative companies, but she also knows how to establish the infrastructure for long-term growth. We’re thrilled to welcome her to the leadership team as we continue to lead in AI security.”

Before joining HiddenLayer, Strong held senior leadership positions at cybersecurity innovators, including HUMAN Security, Blue Lava, and Obsidian Security, where she specialized in building teams, cultivating customer relationships, and shaping emerging markets. She also played pivotal early sales roles at CrowdStrike and FireEye, contributing to their go-to-market success ahead of their IPOs.

“I’m excited to join HiddenLayer at such a pivotal time,” said Strong. “As organizations across every sector rapidly deploy AI, they need partners who understand both the innovation and the risk. HiddenLayer is uniquely positioned to lead this space, and I’m looking forward to helping our customers confidently secure wherever they are in their AI journey.”

With this appointment, HiddenLayer continues to attract top talent to its executive bench, reinforcing its mission to protect the world’s most valuable machine learning assets.

About HiddenLayer
HiddenLayer, a Gartner-recognized Cool Vendor for AI Security, is the leading provider of Security for AI. Its security platform helps enterprises safeguard the machine learning models behind their most important products. HiddenLayer is the only company to offer turnkey security for AI that does not add unnecessary complexity to models and does not require access to raw data and algorithms. Founded by a team with deep roots in security and ML, HiddenLayer aims to protect enterprise AI from inference, bypass, extraction attacks, and model theft. The company is backed by a group of strategic investors, including M12, Microsoft’s Venture Fund, Moore Strategic Ventures, Booz Allen Ventures, IBM Ventures, and Capital One Ventures.

Press Contact
Victoria Lamson
SutherlandGold for HiddenLayer
hiddenlayer@sutherlandgold.com

AUSTIN, TX — July 1, 2025 — HiddenLayer, the leading provider of security for AI models and assets, today announced that it listed its AI Security Platform in the AWS Marketplace for the U.S. Intelligence Community (ICMP). ICMP is a curated digital catalog from Amazon Web Services (AWS) that makes it easy to discover, purchase, and deploy software packages and applications from vendors that specialize in supporting government customers.

HiddenLayer’s inclusion in the AWS ICMP enables rapid acquisition and implementation of advanced AI security technology, all while maintaining compliance with strict federal standards.

“Listing in the AWS ICMP opens a significant pathway for delivering AI security where it’s needed most, at the core of national security missions,” said Chris Sestito, CEO and Co-Founder of HiddenLayer. “We’re proud to be among the companies available in this catalog and are committed to supporting U.S. federal agencies in the safe deployment of AI.”

HiddenLayer is also available to customers in AWS Marketplace, further supporting government efforts to secure AI systems across agencies.

About HiddenLayer
HiddenLayer, a Gartner-recognized Cool Vendor for AI Security, is the leading provider of Security for AI. Its security platform helps enterprises safeguard the machine learning models behind their most important products. HiddenLayer is the only company to offer turnkey security for AI that does not add unnecessary complexity to models and does not require access to raw data and algorithms. Founded by a team with deep roots in security and ML, HiddenLayer aims to protect enterprise AI from inference, bypass, extraction attacks, and model theft. The company is backed by a group of strategic investors, including M12, Microsoft’s Venture Fund, Moore Strategic Ventures, Booz Allen Ventures, IBM Ventures, and Capital One Ventures.

Press Contact
Victoria Lamson
SutherlandGold for HiddenLayer
hiddenlayer@sutherlandgold.com

For years, generative AI vendors have reassured the public and enterprises that large language models are aligned with safety guidelines and reinforced against producing harmful content. Techniques like Reinforcement Learning from Human Feedback have been positioned as the backbone of model alignment, promising ethical responses even in adversarial situations.

But new research from HiddenLayer suggests that confidence may be dangerously misplaced.

Their team has uncovered what they’re calling a universal, transferable bypass technique that can manipulate nearly every major LLM—regardless of vendor, architecture or training pipeline. The method, dubbed “Policy Puppetry,” is a deceptively simple but highly effective form of prompt injection that reframes malicious intent in the language of system configuration, allowing it to circumvent traditional alignment safeguards.

One Prompt to Rule Them All

Unlike earlier attack techniques that relied on model- specific exploits or brute-force engineering, Policy Puppetry introduces a “policy-like” prompt structure— often resembling XML or JSON—that tricks the model into interpreting harmful commands as legitimate system instructions. Coupled with leetspeak encoding and fictional roleplay scenarios, the prompt not only evades detection but often compels the model to comply.

“We found a multi-scenario bypass that seemed extremely effective against ChatGPT 4o,” explained Conor McCauley, a lead researcher on the project. “We then successfully used it to generate harmful content and found, to our surprise, that the same prompt worked against practically all other models.”

The list of affected systems includes OpenAI’s ChatGPT (o1 through 4o), Google’s Gemini family, Anthropic’s Claude, Microsoft’s Copilot, Meta’s LLaMA 3 and 4, DeepSeek, Qwen and Mistral. Even newer models and those fine- tuned for advanced reasoning could be compromised with minor adjustments to the prompt’s structure.

Fiction as a Loophole

A notable element of the technique is its reliance on fictional scenarios to bypass filters. Prompts are framed as scenes from television dramas—like House M.D.—in which characters explain, in detail, how to create anthrax spores or enrich uranium. The use of fictional characters and encoded language disguises the harmful nature of the content.

This method exploits a fundamental limitation of LLMs: their inability to distinguish between story and instruction when alignment cues are subverted. It’s not just an evasion of safety filters—it’s a complete redirection of the model’s understanding of what it is being asked to do.

Extracting the Brain Behind the Bot

Perhaps even more troubling is the technique’s capacity to extract system prompts—the core instruction sets that govern how an LLM behaves. These are typically safeguarded because they contain sensitive directives, safety constraints, and, in some cases, proprietary logic or even hardcoded warnings.

By subtly shifting the roleplay, attackers can get a model to output its entire system prompt verbatim. This not only exposes the operational boundaries of the model but also provides the blueprints for crafting even more targeted attacks.

“The vulnerability is rooted deep in the model’s training data,” said Jason Martin, director of adversarial research at HiddenLayer. “It’s not as easy to fix as a simple code flaw.”

Consequences Beyond the Screen

The implications of this are not confined to digital pranksters or fringe forums. HiddenLayer’s chief trust and security officer, Malcolm Harkins, points to serious real- world consequences: “In domains like healthcare, this could result in chatbot assistants providing medical advice that they shouldn’t, exposing private patient data or invoking medical agent functionality that shouldn’t be exposed.”

The same risks apply across industries: in finance, the potential exposure of sensitive client information; in manufacturing, compromised AI could result in lost yield or downtime; in aviation, corrupted AI guidance could compromise maintenance safety.

In each case, AI systems that were trusted to improve efficiency or safety could become vectors for risk.

RLHF Is Not a Silver Bullet

The research calls into question the sufficiency of RLHF as a security mechanism. While alignment efforts help reduce surface-level misuse, they remain vulnerable to prompt manipulation at a structural level. Models trained to avoid certain words or scenarios can still be misled if the malicious intent is wrapped in the right packaging.

“Superficial filtering and overly simplistic guardrails often mask the underlying security weaknesses of LLMs,” said Chris “Tito” Sestito, co-founder and CEO of HiddenLayer. “As our research shows, these and many more bypasses will continue to surface, making it critical for enterprises and governments to adopt dedicated AI security solutions before these vulnerabilities lead to real-world consequences.”

Rethinking AI Security Architecture

Rather than relying solely on model retraining or RLHF fine-tuning—an expensive and time-consuming process— HiddenLayer advocates for a dual-layer defense approach. External AI monitoring platforms, such as their own AISec and AIDR solutions, act like intrusion detection systems, continuously scanning for signs of prompt injection, misuse and unsafe outputs.

Such solutions allow organizations to respond in real time to novel threats without having to modify the model itself— an approach more akin to zero-trust security in enterprise IT.

The Road Ahead

As generative AI becomes embedded in critical systems— from patient diagnostics to financial forecasting to air traffic control—the attack surface is expanding faster than most organizations can secure it. HiddenLayer’s findings should be viewed as a dire warning: the age of secure-by-alignment AI may be over before it ever truly began.

If one prompt can unlock the worst of what AI can produce, security needs to evolve from hopeful constraint to continuous, intelligent defense.

AUSTIN, Texas – April 23, 2025 – HiddenLayer, the leading security provider for AI models and assets, and Cyera, the pioneer in AI-native data security, today announced a strategic partnership to deliver end-to-end protection for the full AI lifecycle from the data that powers them to the models that drive innovation.

As enterprises embrace AI to accelerate productivity, enable decision-making, and drive innovation, they face growing security risks. HiddenLayer and Cyera are uniting their capabilities to help customers mitigate those risks, offering a comprehensive approach to protecting AI models from pre- to post-deployment. The partnership brings together Cyera’s Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) platform with HiddenLayer’s AISec Platform, creating a first-of-its-kind, full-spectrum defense for AI systems.

“You can’t secure AI without protecting the data enriching it,” said Chris “Tito” Sestito, Co-Founder and CEO of HiddenLayer. “Our partnership with Cyera is a unified commitment to making AI safe and trustworthy from the ground up. By combining model integrity with data-first protection, we’re delivering immediate value to organizations building and scaling secure AI.

Cyera’s AI-native data security platform helps organizations automatically discover and classify sensitive data across environments, monitor AI tool usage, and prevent data misuse or leakage. HiddenLayer’s AISec Platform proactively defends AI models from adversarial threats, prompt injection, data leakage, and model theft.

Together, HiddenLayer and Cyera will enable:

• End-to-end AI lifecycle protection - Secure model training data, the model itself, and the capability set from pre-deployment to runtime.
• Integrated detection and prevention - Enhanced sensitive data detection, classification, and risk remediation at each stage of the AI Ops process.
• Enhanced compliance and security for their customers: HiddenLayer will use Cyera’s platform internally to classify and govern sensitive data flowing through its environment, while Cyera will leverage HiddenLayer’s platform to secure their AI pipelines and protect critical models used in their SaaS platform.

"Mobile and cloud were waves, but AI is a tsunami, unlike anything we’ve seen before. And data is the fuel driving it,” said Jason Clark, Chief Strategy Officer, Cyera. “The top question security leaders ask is: ‘What data is going into the models?’ And the top blocker is: ‘Can we secure it?’ This partnership between HiddenLayer and Cyera solves both: giving organizations the clarity and confidence to move fast, without compromising trust.”

This collaboration goes beyond joint go-to-market. It reflects a shared belief that AI security must start with both model integrity and data protection. As the threat landscape evolves, this partnership delivers immediate value for organizations rapidly building and scaling secure AI initiatives.

“At the heart of every AI model is data that must be safeguarded to ensure ethical, secure, and responsible use of AI,” said Juan Gomez-Sanchez, VP and CISO for McLane, a Berkshire Hathaway Portfolio Company. “HiddenLayer and Cyera are tackling this challenge head-on, and their partnership reflects the type of innovation and leadership the industry desperately needs right now.” 

About HiddenLayer
HiddenLayer, a Gartner-recognized Cool Vendor for AI Security, is the leading provider of Security for AI. Its security platform helps enterprises safeguard the machine learning models behind their most important products. HiddenLayer is the only company to offer turnkey security for AI that does not add unnecessary complexity to models and does not require access to raw data and algorithms. Founded by a team with deep roots in security and ML, HiddenLayer aims to protect enterprise AI from inference, bypass, extraction attacks, and model theft. The company is backed by a group of strategic investors, including M12, Microsoft’s Venture Fund, Moore Strategic Ventures, Booz Allen Ventures, IBM Ventures, and Capital One Ventures.

About Cyera
Cyera is the fastest-growing data security company in the world. Backed by global investors including Sequoia, Accel, and Coatue, Cyera’s AI-powered platform empowers organizations to discover, secure, and leverage their most valuable asset—data. Its AI-native, agentless architecture delivers unmatched speed, precision, and scale across the entire enterprise ecosystem. Pioneering the integration of Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) with real-time enforcement controls, Adaptive Data Loss Prevention (DLP), Cyera is delivering the industry’s first unified Data Security Platform—enabling organizations to proactively manage data risk and confidently harness the power of their data in today’s complex digital landscape.

Contact
Maia Gryskiewicz
SutherlandGold for HiddenLayer
hiddenlayer@sutherlandgold.com

Yael Wissner-Levy
VP, Global Communications at Cyera
yaelw@cyera.io