Nebulock Emerges from Stealth with $8.5M Funding to Revolutionize AI-Powered Threat Hunting

A new AI threat-hunting startup has emerged from stealth with backing from Bain Capital Ventures, In-Q-Tel

Why it matters: Cyber defenders are in a race against malicious hackers to embrace AI tools before automated attacks become the norm. * Some of the biggest advancements for defenders are coming from startups that have the flexibility to build new technologies from scratch, rather than retrofitting AI capabilities into existing products. Driving the news: Nebulock emerged from stealth today with $8.5 million in funding, including a fresh $6 million seed round led by Bain. Zoom in: Nebulock offers an autonomous threat-hunting platform that actively scans and responds to malicious activity on a company's system. * The product -- which uses both machine learning algorithms and AI agents to study telemetry data -- can be plugged into the existing security stack, including CrowdStrike, Okta and Splunk, via an API to detect endpoint, identity and cloud security threats. * While in stealth, Nebulock tested its products with a variety of customers across health tech companies, banks and VC-backed technology firms, Damien Lewke, the startup's founder and CEO, told Axios. The big picture: 90% of companies say they're not ready for AI-powered cyber threats, and cyber threat hunters are inundated with alerts about potential malicious activity across their companies' environments. * Defenders have been eager for AI-enabled tools that can not only help them sort through those notifications but also automatically respond to significant threats. * "Our vision is to have Nebulock be that teammate that tips the balance of power back in the hands of network defenders," Lewke said. Reality check: Cybersecurity has long been a crowded market, and automated threat response is no different. But Lewke told Axios that customers' awareness of the problem has been high. What's next: Lewke said the startup will use the new funds to hire more engineers and sales and marketing employees and also to build out the platform to expand the types of threats it can detect.

Threat hunting startup Nebulock closes $8.5M to grow AI threat detection engine - SiliconANGLE

Threat hunting startup Nebulock closes $8.5M to grow AI threat detection engine Threat hunting startup Nebulock Inc. announced today that it had raised $8.5 million in new funding to fuel the expansion of its autonomous threat hunting capabilities, enhance its cross-telemetry correlation engine and scale its engineering and go-to-market teams. Founded in 2023, Nebulock offers an artificial intelligence-powered cybersecurity platform that delivers autonomous threat hunting capabilities to help organizations detect and respond to advanced threats. The platform is designed for enterprises that lack the vast resources of Fortune 100 firms and simplifies the traditionally time-consuming and resource-heavy process of threat detection. The Nebulock platform continuously hunts for threats across endpoint, identity and application telemetry to deliver high-fidelity alerts that don't rely on static detection rules or manual workflows. The platform is powered by an agentic AI engine that offers behavior-based threat hunting that continuously scans telemetry data for signs of policy violations, lateral movement and attacker pre-positioning. Doing so allows security teams to surface threats that would typically evade traditional endpoint detection and response and security information and event management. Nebulock's approach ensures that no single point of failure can stop detection efforts, an essential feature in today's landscape of increasingly AI-enabled adversaries. Nebulock's platform integrates with existing security tools such as those from CrowdStrike Holdings Inc., Okta Inc. and Splunk Inc. through application programming interface-based connections, eliminating the need for additional agents or disruptive changes to security workflows. The platform is also built to support natural language interaction, allowing analysts to write and test detection logic using plain English. "As adversaries increasingly use AI to their advantage, we built Nebulock to help defenders turn that technology into a practical asset," explains Damien Lewke, founder and chief executive officer of Nebulock. "Our platform works around the clock as an autonomous threat hunter, using agentic AI to deliver high-fidelity alerts in real time. It enhances human judgment and enables security teams to stay ahead of emerging threats." Bain Capital Ventures led the seed round, with Decibel Partners, In-Q-Tel Inc., Zetta Venture Partners, Step Function and Aviso Ventures also participating. "Nebulock's AI agents don't just scan for known IOCs -- they execute autonomous, behavior-based threat hunts that learn your environment," said Rak Garg, partner at Bain Capital Ventures. "Autonomous Nebulock agents are the future of threat hunting: essential virtual teammates for every security organization focused on detection and response."