PRESS RELEASE
RESTON, Virginia and TEL AVIV, Israel, April 11, 2024/PRNewswire-PRWeb/ — Knostic, the world’s first provider of access controls needed for generative AI, emerges from the shadows today, having been named one of the top three finalists for the 2024 RSA Conference Launch Pad competition.
Organizations are rapidly adopting Large Language Models (LLM) and tools like Microsoft Copilot and Glean to create systems similar to ChatGPT, but with their own institutional knowledge. Such systems also introduce business risks, primarily by exposing content that is outside the employee’s need-to-know, such as bonuses, sales revenue, and mergers and acquisitions information. With Knostic, employees can access everything they need, but with responses modeled on exactly what they need to do their jobs according to organizational policy.
“Microsoft Copilot, Glean and other LLMs are similar to a race car engine. Data is the fuel. But who wants to drive fast without brakes? We are the brakes, giving companies the confidence to accelerate the adoption of LLM, while ensuring the safety of their most valuable assets,” said Sounil Yu, co-founder and CTO of Knostic.
Knostic’s offering also helps organizations in the early adoption phase by understanding their exposure to breaches that need to be known and the path to secure implementation of LLM-based tools. Traditional data security approaches, such as permission-based access control, are not sufficient in the LLM era, and new approaches are needed.
Gadi Evron, co-founder and CEO of Knostic, further elaborated: “From a misfiled payroll spreadsheet and a sensitive presenter comment left in a template, or even from secrets inferred from legitimately accessible content, LLMs accelerate the discovery of malicious and potentially dangerous information. to anyone who asks. Knostic goes beyond legacy authorization models and shapes access based on the user’s actual need to know.”
Founded in late 2023 by cybersecurity veterans Gadi Evron (serial entrepreneur, previously of Citibank and PwC) and Sounil Yu (former chief security scientist at Bank of America), Knostic raised a 3-year pre-seed funding round $.3 million, with participation from Shield Capital, Pitango First, DNX Ventures and Seedcamp, as well as angel investors Kevin Mahaffey (Lookout), David Cross (Rain Capital), Bryson Bort (SCYTHE), Travis McPeak (Resourcely), Matthew Honea (Forward Networks) and others.
Raj Shah of Shield Capital: “Security is a critical factor in enterprise adoption of large language models,” said Raj Shah, managing partner at Shield Capital. “We are proud to partner with Gadi and Sounil who are building innovative solutions at Knostic.ai.”
Admiral Mike Rogers (Ret.), former head of the NSA: “Knostic’s unique approach to ‘necessary’ customization is what unlocks LLM for enterprises, not to mention the DoD space. I’m excited about the journey ahead.”
About Knostic
Knostic is the world’s first provider of need-to-know access controls for Large Language Models (LLM). With knowledge-centric capabilities, Knostic enables organizations to accelerate LLM adoption and drive AI-driven innovation without compromising value, safety or security.
For more details, visit https://www.knostic.ai/