Cybersecurity AI Startups to Follow in 2026

What is Cybersecurity?

For startups, cybersecurity refers to technologies and services designed to protect digital systems, data, and users from cyber threats—such as hacking, data breaches, ransomware, and fraud.

What Cybersecurity Means for Startups

Cybersecurity startups build solutions at the intersection of technology, risk management, and trust. They help organizations prevent attacks, detect threats early, and respond quickly when security incidents occur—often improving on legacy tools that are complex, reactive, or siloed.

Common Focus Areas

• Threat Detection & Response: Tools that monitor networks, endpoints, and cloud environments for suspicious activity.

• Identity & Access Management (IAM): Solutions that control who can access systems, including authentication and privilege management.

• Cloud & Application Security: Protecting SaaS platforms, APIs, and cloud infrastructure.

• Data Security & Privacy: Encryption, data loss prevention, and tools that support compliance with privacy regulations.

• Fraud Prevention: Technologies that detect financial fraud, account takeovers, and abuse in real time.

• Security Automation: Platforms that reduce manual security work through AI, orchestration, and automated response.

Why It’s Attractive to Founders and Investors

• Mission-Critical Need: Security is non-negotiable for modern businesses across every industry.

• Growing Threat Landscape: Cyberattacks are increasing in frequency, sophistication, and cost.

• Recurring Revenue Models: Many cybersecurity products operate on subscription or usage-based pricing.

• Enterprise & SMB Demand: Both large organizations and small businesses need better, simpler security solutions.

The Influence of AI in Cybersecurity

Artificial intelligence is transforming cybersecurity by enabling faster, more accurate threat detection and automated responses, enhancing protection for enterprises and consumers. 

Here are four cybersecurity companies to follow in 2025:

Hunters.AI

Hunters is an AI-powered SIEM that changes the way SOCs operate. Hunters automates the entire TDIR process, replacing repetitive human work with machine-powered detection, enrichment, correlation, prioritization, triage, and investigation, freeing analysts to proactively protect their organizations. Hunters utilizes an open security data lake architecture, ensuring complete and cost-effective coverage of the entire security stack. Companies like Booking.com and Snowflake use Hunters to empower their security teams. 

BioCatch

BioCatch is the leader in behavioral biometrics which analyzes an online user’s physical and cognitive digital behavior to protect individuals and their assets. The company’s mission is to unlock the power of behavior and deliver actionable insights to create a digital world where identity, trust and ease seamlessly co-exist. Leading financial institutions around the globe use BioCatch to more effectively fight fraud, drive digital transformation and accelerate business growth. The team has over a decade of analyzing data and over 60 patents.

Deep Instinct

Deep Instinct is the first and only zero-day data security company built on a deep learning cybersecurity framework, preventing unknown threats in <20 milliseconds, 750X faster than the fastest ransomware can encrypt. Deep Instinct Data Security X (DSX) secures data at-rest or in-motion – across cloud, NAS, applications, and endpoints. DSX Brain, Deep Instinct’s deep learning framework, prevents zero-day threats that no one else can find, with >99% accuracy and a <0.1% false positive rate. DIANNA, the DSX Companion, leverages GenAI to provide unparalleled explainability into unknown threats in <10 seconds.

SAM Seamless Networks

SAM is the leading provider of cloud-native security and intelligence services for unmanaged networks and IoTs, covering upwards of 500 million connected devices globally. Using AI, SAM addresses the challenges of a hyperconnected world, in which an explosion of IoT devices exposes potential attack surfaces for companies and consumers. SAM’s device-agnostic software provides deep ​network visibility to not only protect against sophisticated cyber-attacks in real-time, but also to prevent the spread of zero-day attacks. SAM’s solution is proven to provide telcos with new revenue streams, reduced churn, and minimized support costs.