AI Governance & Security Vendor Wiki

3 min read

CyberArk

Primary category: non-human-identity. The privileged-access-management (PAM) incumbent, now Palo Alto Networks’ Identity Security pillar.

One-liner — The market-leading privileged access management vendor — vaults, rotates, and brokers access to the most powerful human, machine, and (increasingly) AI-agent credentials — acquired by palo-alto-networks in a ~$25B deal that closed February 2026.

What it does — CyberArk started in privileged access management (vaulting admin/root credentials, session isolation and recording, just-in-time elevation) and expanded across the identity spectrum: secrets management for DevOps/cloud (conjur), machine/non-human identity, workforce and customer identity, and identity governance. For an AI buyer, the relevant frontier is identity security for agentic AI — treating autonomous agents as a new class of privileged identity that needs least-privilege, just-in-time access and credential governance. That framing is the explicit rationale for the PANW acquisition.

Where it sits in the stack — Foundation-layer identity. Tagged non-human-identity (primary), secrets-management (via conjur and CyberArk Secrets Manager), identity-governance (access certs / lifecycle), and tool-identity-integration (brokering agent→tool credentials). It limits blast radius by controlling which identities can reach which secrets/systems — constraining both access to sensitive data and outbound reach.

Deployment & architecture — Self-hosted vault, SaaS (Privilege Cloud / Identity Security Platform), and hybrid. Conjur provides API-driven secrets injection for CI/CD and cloud-native workloads. Integrates with IdPs, SIEM, cloud providers, and Kubernetes.

Positioning & differentiators — Known as the PAM gold standard for regulated enterprises (banks, funds, governments). Differentiator vs. cloud-native secrets (hashicorp-vault, aws-secrets-manager, azure-key-vault) is breadth: session controls, recording, and an enterprise governance wrapper rather than just key storage. Vs. NHI startups (astrix-security, aembit, oasis-security, token-security) it is the incumbent with the install base. Post-acquisition, identity becomes a fourth PANW platform pillar alongside Strata/Cortex/Prisma.

Ownership, funding & M&A — Founded 1999 (Udi Mokady, Alon N. Cohen); HQ Petah Tikva, Israel, with major US ops in Newton, MA. Public on NASDAQ (CYBR) from its 2014 IPO. Acquired by palo-alto-networks — VERIFIED: announced 2025-07-30 at ~$25B equity value ($45.00 cash + 2.2005 PANW shares per CyberArk share, 26% premium); transaction closed 2026-02-11 after US/EU/UK/Israel regulatory clearance and shareholder approval. The seed flag “acq by Palo Alto” is confirmed against PANW’s own press release and corroborating SEC filings (PANW 8-K, CyberArk 6-K/425). CyberArk itself was an acquirer: it bought Conjur (2017, ~$42M), Idaptive, Venafi (machine identity), and Zilla Security among others.

CTO / hedge-fund lens — Day-2 in this taxonomy, but effectively Day-1 for a regulated fund that already needs PAM for its privileged human admins; AI/agent governance is an extension of controls you should already have. SR 11-7 relevance is indirect (credential governance for model-serving and agent infrastructure). The ownership change matters for procurement: a CyberArk renewal now routes through Palo Alto Networks and may be bundled with Strata/Cortex.

Competitors / alternatives — astrix-security, aembit, oasis-security, token-security, entro-security, silverfort (NHI/identity); sailpoint, saviynt, veza (IGA); hashicorp-vault (secrets).

Open questions / to verify

  • Integration roadmap of CyberArk into Cortex/Strata and how licensing is repackaged.
  • Whether Conjur remains separately marketed or is folded into a unified Secrets Manager SKU.

Sources

History

  • [2026-06-28] Stub created from seed registry.
  • [2026-06-28] Researched; CONFIRMED seed M&A flag: acquired by Palo Alto Networks (announced 2025-07-30, ~$25B; closed 2026-02-11) against PANW press release + SEC filings. Raised ownership_confidence low→high. Established founded 1999, HQ Petah Tikva (US: Newton MA), formerly NASDAQ: CYBR. Noted CyberArk’s own acquisitions (Conjur 2017, Venafi, Idaptive, Zilla).

Graph View

Backlinks