The internet faces a new concern. Alongside the rise of vibe coding tools and the codebases, sites, and apps they create, security issues and blind spots have also proliferated.
Cybersecurity company Guardio is targeting a new market emerging from this shift: finding malicious code written using AI tools. The company reports that with AI tools, malicious actors now find it easier than ever to build scam and phishing sites as well as the infrastructure needed to run them.
Now, Guardio is leveraging its experience building browser extensions and apps that scan for malicious and phishing sites to create a tool that looks for artifacts in code and websites made with vibe coding tools.
It has already found a buyer. Earlier this month, Lovable announced a partnership with Guardio to scan all websites made on its platform and weed out the ones that may pose threats to users. This deal followed a report highlighting that several sites built on Lovable had significant security holes.
Michael Vainshtein, the startup’s CTO, stated that everyone is racing for innovation and market capture, but security is often an afterthought. He noted that not many AI tools are partnering with cybersecurity companies to ensure content generated on their platform is secure and used for good.
To fund its expansion, the company has raised eighty million dollars in a new institutional funding round led by ION Crossover Partners. Existing backers Union Tech Ventures, Vintage Investment Partners, and Emerge also invested.
Guardio, founded in 2018 by Vainshtein, CEO Amos Peled, and chief architect Daniel Sirota, did not disclose its exact valuation. However, it did say it has tripled its valuation since its previous fundraise, a forty-seven million dollar round led by Tiger Global in 2021. The company stated it does not consider itself a unicorn yet.
Guardio started as a browser extension that monitored malicious sites and alerted users about data leaks. Since then, it has added phishing protection and built mobile apps that offer identity management, spam filtering, and scam protection. The company says it now has five hundred thousand paying users and claims it reached one hundred million dollars in annual recurring revenue this year.
Guardio is also launching new visibility features to tell users more about what documents they have shared publicly and if they have any sensitive information, along with notifying them of accounts that lack multi-factor authentication. The startup said these features are based on enterprise Data Loss Prevention and SaaS Security Posture Management products.
Vainshtein explained that people use so many services and their data is so fragmented with numerous security settings to manage that every consumer is like an enterprise. He said that while they do not want users to become security officers of their own accounts, they aim to offer the same visibility capabilities that enterprises have.
The startup said it is working to let users connect its tool to Outlook and Facebook to surface more details on the security risks users might face with these accounts.
Peled noted that next year, the startup plans to bring some of the new visibility features to its free subscription plan.
Gilad Shany, founder and partner at ION Crossover, said the investment firm had been monitoring the company for years. He explained that even though Guardio was not actively fundraising, ION started a conversation with the company last year. Shany stated that they have been investors in both the cyber and consumer markets and have had multiple successful IPOs and exits. He described Guardio as the first company they invest in at the intersection of these two markets, praising its team for leading best-in-class cyber product innovation while having intimate knowledge about how to scale a direct-to-consumer business.