Palo Alto Networks’ Nikesh Arora is building a defense against the dark side of AI

In April, Palo Alto Networks CEO Nikesh Arora subjected the company's internal infrastructure to an unreleased AI model called Mythos, developed by Anthropic. The powerful AI model, designed for advanced coding and cybersecurity work, proved exceptionally effective at identifying vulnerabilities in the systems. This led the U.S. government to impose export controls on Mythos and a related model, Fable, in June.

However, the government later permitted the model's access to a few vetted U.S. users and eventually allowed Anthropic to make it available to select users in 15 other countries.

Arora realized that Mythos and competing models from AI rivals OpenAI had created "the best marketing moment for the cybersecurity industry in history." The model's capabilities underscored the potential for attackers to quickly find vulnerabilities that could cripple critical infrastructure. This realization, coupled with recent incidents involving AI agents "going rogue," has prompted leading AI vendors, including Anthropic, to call for a coordinated slowdown among AI system builders to allow safety measures to catch up.

For Arora, the challenges posed by AI are both a growth opportunity and an existential threat. As the company's CEO, Arora is at the center of this widening reckoning in tech and is a sought-after counselor to AI leaders and other CEOs. He has been consulted by Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, who admits that the capabilities of OpenAI's models have changed the risk equation for companies worldwide. "We need a new model of cybersecurity here," Altman tells Fortune.

Palo Alto Networks has expanded beyond its traditional firewall offerings to encompass network, cloud, identity, endpoint, and observability areas. The company's customers include a significant portion of the Fortune 500, such as Tyson Foods, Colgate-Palmolive, the National Hockey League, and Major League Baseball. With an estimated total addressable market in the hundreds of billions, Arora is confident that Palo Alto Networks can grow its market share.