Microsoft injects AI agents into security tools
Microsoft said Monday it will soon roll out 11 new AI agents for its security-focused Copilot aimed at offloading some of the most repetitive tasks that bog down cybersecurity teams.
Why it matters: Microsoft is the latest major vendor to embed autonomous AI agents directly into its security suite in an effort to reduce burnout for cyber pros and boost efficiency through AI-powered automation.
The big picture: Security professionals have long hoped that AI could help close the cybersecurity workforce gap and ease analyst burnout.
The U.S. only has enough cyber professionals to fill 83% of the available cyber jobs, according to federal data.
Security teams spend about three hours a day just responding to alerts, with some teams seeing more than 4,400 alerts daily, according to research from Vectra AI.
While many legacy cybersecurity vendors have released AI copilots or assistants, only a small group have rolled out agents that can take autonomous action.
Zoom in: Starting next month, Microsoft will make six of its own new agents and five agents from partner companies available for preview in Security Copilot — which is already integrated into all of Microsoft's security tools.
Each agent focuses on a different task: One specifically combs through potential phishing emails. Another can craft notification letters to send to different regulators after a data breach.
Customers can configure each agent's level of access and autonomy, including whether the agent acts under its own identity (with a unique username and password) or as an extension of a human account.
Each agent also has a map of its thinking so human users can review their decisions — and even override or correct their selections.
Case in point: If an agent wrongly flags a training email as phishing, the security team can label it a false positive and instruct the agent not to flag messages from that vendor again.
Between the lines: Microsoft says the new agents are a direct response to customer feedback.
Agents are "an inflection point for us," Vasu Jakkal, corporate VP of security at Microsoft, told Axios at a media preview event on Thursday. "Copilot was more like question-answer, and (customers) always asked us 'Well, we would like it to one-click and get that done.'"
Microsoft first made Security Copilot widely available last year, and Jakkal said customers quickly began asking for more autonomous functionality.
Partners rolling out agents in Copilot include OneTrust, Aviatrix, BlueVoyant, Tanium and Fletch.
What they're saying: "There's just opportunity everywhere," Dorothy Li, corporate VP of Microsoft Security Copilot, told Axios.
"These are the [tasks] that had the highest amount of pain, most volume and where agents can make the most impact today and that's where we chose to start."
Microsoft also anticipates that it will roll out more security agents in the near future, Li added.
The intrigue: Microsoft also relied on an internal generative AI red team to pressure test the new agents for potential security risks.
The red team worked closely with product teams throughout the entire development lifecycle, said Victoria Westerhoff, director of AI safety and security red teaming at Microsoft.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Axios
an hour ago
- Axios
Exclusive: X piloting new program to elevate content users agree on
Elon Musk's X is piloting a new program to use its Community Notes feature to highlight posts where people of typically differing opinions actually agree with each other, Axios has learned. Why it matters: The goal is to build momentum around opinions that are widely shared, which could help make conversations on and off X less polarizing. How it works: Currently, Community Notes are used for content that has been marked as potentially misleading. Those notes are only featured in users' feeds when a note's content is deemed helpful by X users who typically disagree. As a part of X's small pilot program, it will test Community Notes on posts that are not necessarily deemed as potentially misleading, as a way to foster more public conversations around issues where X believes people tend to have more common ground than is understood. The pilot will start with a very small handful of Community Notes users in the U.S. before gradually expanding, said X's VP of product Keith Coleman. Those selected to be part of the pilot will not be notified directly that they have been selected, but will start to see callouts in their main feeds to add context to everyday posts. (See image above.) The callouts will be added to posts based on early and limited "like" engagement signals from those posts. Select contributors will be asked to rate and provide more feedback about each post, such as whether they think the content helps to unify a polarizing opinion or if it's funny. That feedback will be used to help develop an open source algorithm to identifies posts liked by people from different perspectives, per Coleman. Between the lines: X is using data from its existing Community Notes participants to help identify users with a range of viewpoints who will be a part of the pilot, Coleman said. The rest will be selected at random. Those selected to participate will have a separate feed in their timelines that will guide them to more posts to add context. Of note: For now, only selected participants from the pilot will be able to post Notes and see them in their feeds, Coleman said. Eventually, all X users will be able to add Notes and see the posts with additional context in their feeds once X gathers enough data from its pilot. Zoom out: Coleman joined Twitter in 2016 and was part of the team that helped build the original Community Notes program. He said the rollout of X's new feature will mirror the way Twitter rolled out Birdwatch, now called Community Notes, in 2021. The first cohort of people who were selected to pilot what is today Community Notes was just 1,000 people, Coleman notes. The big picture: Once seen as a bold effort to replace fact-checking, X's Community Notes feature is now being adopted by other internet giants as a preferred way of moderating internet content. Most notably, Meta eliminated fact-checkers in the U.S. in January, arguing they were too politically biased. It began testing community notes as a replacement, using open-source technology from X shortly thereafter. The bottom line: Contrary to what the public may think about social media conversations, X's data shows that "there's actually quite a lot of agreement, even on controversial issues," Coleman said. The pilot, he believes, has the potential to build momentum and energy around opinions that are widely shared, which could reshape social discourse and how we think about governing. "It has potential to change the world," he said.
Fox News
an hour ago
- Fox News
Former Biden officials ridicule Karine Jean-Pierre's book as 'bizarre cash grab'
Several former Biden officials and staffers have spoken out against ex-White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre's announcement that she was becoming an independent after serving in a Democratic administration, which came alongside a book announcement. "Everyone thinks this is a grift," a former official told Politico. Jean-Pierre announced Wednesday that her new book, "Independent: A Look Inside a Broken White House, Outside the Party Lines," would be released in October. "SHE was the public face telling us all that this White House was on track and that Biden was amazing. And now she doesn't even want to be a Democrat????" a former Biden White House official told the outlet. "She's making herself the middle ground here when Republicans hate her. She's not in any position to be a connector of our two party system and assuming she could be is just ego." "It's hard to believe someone could look at the past year and genuinely think, 'The party left Joe Biden — that's why I'm leaving the Democratic Party,'" a former senior spokesperson for the Biden administration told Axios. "The hubris of thinking you can position yourself as an outsider when you not only have enjoyed the perks of extreme proximity to power… but have actively wielded it from the biggest pulpit there is, is as breathtaking as it is desperate ... It's difficult to see how this is anything but a bizarre cash grab," another White House communications official told the outlet. "She made a joke about being an independent last year and now it's a book. All ideas are monetary — even the dumb ones," a former Jean-Pierre staffer told Politico. Politico reported that Gilda Squire, a publicist, worked with Jean-Pierre while she was in the White House and was included on multiple official emails, until her staffers said it was an issue and raised it with the White House counsel office. The outlet noted that Jean-Pierre was the subject of a gushing Vogue profile, in addition to a profile in Women's Health. The former press secretary also appeared on "The View" in person and from the White House while she was press secretary. Axios reporter Alex Thompson asked Squire about boosting Jean-Pierre in February 2024 and the publicist said off the record that none of it was true. Thompson reported Thursday, "Internal White House emails obtained later by Axios, however, show that Squire was copied on emails related to Jean-Pierre's publicity work. The messages included a September 2023 email describing plans for a Vogue magazine profile." Former Jean-Pierre staffer, Jeremy Edwards, reacted on X to the book announcement. "Lol," Edwards wrote. Another White House communications official told Axios, "Today Karine lost the only constituency that ever supported her — party line Democrats." White House reporters who covered the Biden administration also criticized Jean-Pierre's announcement. "Did she find the manuscript somewhere in that fat binder she toted around? If I were a historian writing about the Biden White House, I wouldn't ignore what Karine has to say, but it's not an account in which much weight will be invested — just like her briefings," a White House reporter told Fox News Digital. Another White House reporter told Fox News Digital they were "shocked" that Jean-Pierre had left the Democratic Party. "I have to pick my jaw up from the floor. It is unbelievable that she, of all people, would choose this path," the reporter said. Jean-Pierre, a veteran Democratic Party operative who also worked for the 2020 Biden-Harris campaign and served as a spokeswoman for the far-left MoveOn advocacy group, said in a post on Instagram that the book was about not always being in a "partisan stance." Jean-Pierre repeatedly defended Biden when faced with questions about the president's decline, and even laughed at a question about his ability to serve past 2024 during an interview in 2022. Jean-Pierre's publicist did not immediately return a request for comment.
Business Wire
2 hours ago
- Business Wire
Top Engineer from Microsoft, Tesla Joins The Nuclear Company to Lead Software Division
COLUMBIA, S.C.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- The Nuclear Company, which is leading fleet-scale deployment of nuclear power across America and pioneering the modernization of nuclear construction, today announced the hiring of Microsoft and Tesla engineering veteran Owen Lloyd as Vice President, Software Engineering. Lloyd spent more than 16 years at Microsoft, where, as Senior Director of Engineering, he oversaw the expansive team of engineers developing software for the heralded Surface line of laptops and tablets. He also worked closely with large suppliers including Intel and Qualcomm, bringing strong experience with complex supply chains like those involved in nuclear construction. Despite the need for nuclear's firm, clean baseload power, the biggest challenges facing the industry, which creates high-paying head-of-household jobs, are that nuclear projects are almost always over budget and behind schedule. Lloyd will lead a team of AI/ML software engineers, data scientists and product specialists to develop a pioneering construction platform that will employ cutting-edge digital technologies, such as AI-driven site selection, real-time construction updates, and integrated supply chain logistics. This approach will pair with advanced construction and manufacturing methods to ensure The Nuclear Company builds on time and on budget, as it deploys its first 6-gigawatt fleet of nuclear reactors across America using proven, already licensed reactor technology and a design-once, build-many methodology. 'The world's largest technology companies rely on nuclear and its firm, clean baseload energy to power their AI data centers,' said The Nuclear Company Chief Nuclear Officer Joe Klecha, who was tasked with taking over the building of Vogtle units 3 and 4 in the midst of the ongoing project. The two reactors are the only ones started and built in America in the past three decades. 'Just as these tech giants need nuclear, the nuclear industry needs to utilize the advanced technology they have developed.' Lloyd also brings leadership experience from Tesla, where his engineering team shipped major in-vehicle software updates bi-weekly. Among his work was helping launch the company's Model 3 vehicle. He also held leadership roles at LG, where he improved software platforms for smart televisions, and Salesforce, where his responsibilities included upgraded sales cloud features for workers in the field. 'I've seen firsthand as a leader at some of the world's largest companies how vital nuclear is to powering economic expansion and technology innovation,' Lloyd said. 'I was drawn to The Nuclear Company because of its technology-first approach, as well as my drive to solve the most complex challenges and building nuclear reactors is among humanity's most impressive feats.' About The Nuclear Company The Nuclear Company is pioneering the modernization of nuclear construction and leading fleet-scale deployment of nuclear power across America. By integrating proven, licensed reactor technologies with digital innovation and its design-once, build-many methodology, the company aims to reduce costs and shorten development timelines. This approach leverages AI-powered real-time construction monitoring and advanced project management to streamline deployment and ensure on-time, on-budget delivery. The Nuclear Company is committed to delivering safe baseload electricity at the lowest cost, while catalyzing the nuclear industry toward rapid development in America and globally. For more information, visit:
