Pluto Security raises $42M as AI gives enterprise security teams a new headache
The problem with giving everyone in a company access to AI tools is that people will use them in unexpected ways. And that fact is steadily seeding fears that companies now have new, gaping security holes in their systems or, at least, will soon.
Key points
- Pluto Security raised $42 million, including an $8.5 million seed round and a $34 million Series A.
- CEO Shahar Bahat says 60% of risks her company detects are in tools vibe-coded by non-developers.
- Pluto began selling in April and has crossed $2 million in annual recurring revenue with over 30 enterprise customers.
Pluto Security, a startup that helps companies monitor and control how employees use AI tools, has raised $42 million in funding. The company emerged from stealth with an $8.5 million seed round led by TLV Partners and a $34 million Series A led by Jump Capital.
CEO and co-founder Shahar Bahat told TechCrunch that a new AI tool can appear inside a company's environment within two hours of its release. She said about 60% of the risks her company detects across its customer base are in tools vibe-coded by non-developers, with finance departments the biggest source, followed by marketing and legal teams, and developers fourth.
Traction and funding details
Pluto started selling in April and has already crossed $2 million in annual recurring revenue, with more than 30 enterprise customers including Oscar Health, Workato, Sixt, and AlphaSense. The seed round was led by TLV Partners, with cybersecurity firm Armis' founders also investing. The Series A was led by Jump Capital, with Skinos (Check Point co-founder Shlomo Kramer's venture firm), Ansa Capital, and other angel investors participating.
Bahat said 70% of Pluto's sales pipeline now comes from inbound interest, though she did not break down how much comes directly through Plutonium. The company plans to invest the new capital in developing its product, expanding security research, and growing its presence in the U.S. It has 40 employees in the U.S. and Israel.
In general, I'll say there was not one POC in which we entered and didn't find malicious stuff.
— Shahar Bahat
How the system works
Pluto's software monitors the AI tools employees use, the skills, extensions, MCP servers, and other components those tools rely on, as well as the apps and agents being created. The company says it can identify risky components, spot potentially dangerous agent activity, and enforce security policies without stopping employees from using or making AI tools.
To do this, Pluto connects to endpoint security and device management systems and can deploy its own sensors through them or directly onto devices. It gathers information including prompts, commands, running processes, permissions, and users' previous activity, and uses its own lightweight models on endpoints to assess what an agent is trying to do. Bahat said the system can intervene while an agent is working, for example by stopping an action or injecting instructions into the session to prompt the agent to ask for confirmation.
