Software program is more and more constructed and attacked by AI, and Y Combinator-backed Escape simply raised $18 million from Balderton Capital to guard it with AI too. The key to success, nevertheless, could be very human: belief.
Based in 2020 first as a analysis lab that later morphed right into a industrial firm, Escape co-founders Tristan Kalos, CEO, and Antoine Carossio, CTO, have constructed AI brokers to ethically hack code to reveal weaknesses, after which repair them.
Kalos and Carossio met at UC Berkeley throughout an entrepreneurship programme; that they had backgrounds in machine studying and cybersecurity, respectively, and located themselves chewing the fats over how insecure on a regular basis digital companies are.
After an organization Kalos had labored for was hacked, they requested one another: Why not create an AI system that may really clear up this drawback? “And that’s how the unique idea began,” Kalos instructed Tech Funding Information.
OpenAI launched ChatGPT in late 2022. The explosion of generative AI introduced an explosion of AI-generated code, which can be extra liable to weaknesses. Escape’s personal analysis discovered over 2,000 serious vulnerabilities in apps constructed with vibe coding platforms.
On the identical time, AI-driven assaults have skyrocketed, rising 89% year-on-year in 2025, in accordance with a CrowdStrike report. Most just lately, a hacker used Anthropic’s chatbot to assault Mexican authorities companies and steal 150 gigabytes of information.
“It’s fairly a singular second in cybersecurity,” Kalos mentioned, however safety groups can’t transfer quick sufficient to check scripts or sort out vulnerabilities. “So what we’re doing is utilizing AI to scale the efforts of safety groups and permit them to safe code on the tempo of AI, towards AI.”
Uncover, take a look at and treatment
Escape’s AI brokers work by mapping digital infrastructure corresponding to apps, APIs, databases, and endpoints and exams them for vulnerabilities. The brokers simulate assault chains then produce proof-of-exploitation, displaying precisely how a vulnerability was discovered and the way it may be triggered.
It then works to treatment the problems by automated fixes that contextualise every vulnerability. It additionally provides copy steps in order that safety groups can confirm the repair and make sure the AI agent didn’t introduce extra weaknesses.
“We’re seeing a change in the way in which individuals safe functions, in the way in which individuals construct functions, in the way in which individuals assault functions as a result of the know-how is altering so quick,” Kalos mentioned.
“It was merely inconceivable to automate this course of from discovery to remediation earlier than. Nonetheless right this moment, it’s very onerous, proper? It requires a variety of analysis and growth, however we will see the longer term is about end-to-end.”
Corporations not often do vulnerability discovery, testing and remediation in a single stream, which is what units Escape other than opponents, corresponding to Crossbow and Terra Safety, per the CEO.
The most important problem for him, nevertheless, has been a really human one: belief. Safety is “fairly a conservative market” the place it may be troublesome to earn the belief of groups, he mentioned.
“Even you probably have the perfect product or the perfect resolution out there, that isn’t sufficient. You additionally have to create belief. It is advisable to get on the market, discuss to individuals, create belief, and people will turn out to be prospects down the highway, after you create this relationship.”
It’s not a typical vendor-customer relationship. Moderately, distributors are like companions and the connection must be cultivated and nurtured repeatedly, he mentioned.
That’s one factor that caught the attention of Balderton, which led the deal. “We’re massively impressed with how quickly Escape has turn out to be a trusted platform for classy organisations world wide,” mentioned Suranga Chandratillake, accomplice on the agency.
“The times of pen-testing being a sporadic, manually pushed course of are over,” he added.
Constructing a global firm
Chandratillake is a former founder who had success within the Valley, giving him a transatlantic perspective that may solely profit a startup constructing on either side of the pond.
“We consider variety of mindset, experience and opinions within the cap desk and within the advisors of Escape,” Kalos added, pointing to the startup’s different new investor Uncorrelated Ventures in addition to present traders IRIS and YC.
That is mirrored within the startup’s 32-person workforce, which is 30% feminine, Kalos mentioned. Over 12 nationalities are represented too. This melting pot of tradition is one thing that Kalos himself embodies, as a French native now primarily based in New York who used to dwell in Spain and South America.
The Sequence A, which brings the corporate’s complete funding to $23 million, shall be used to roughly double the workforce within the coming 12 months and increase its core know-how and merchandise to higher serve massive enterprise prospects.
Tapping again into the belief theme, Escape is concentrated on constructing that “partner-style” relationship that safety groups anticipate.
