Okta Buys Permiso for Nearly $200 Million as AI Agent Security Demand Grows
Updated
Updated · TechCrunch · Jul 30
Okta Buys Permiso for Nearly $200 Million as AI Agent Security Demand Grows
1 articles · Updated · TechCrunch · Jul 30
Summary
Just under $200 million will buy Permiso Security in an almost all-cash deal, giving Okta technology to detect threats tied to AI agents and other machine identities.
Third-quarter fiscal 2027 is the expected close, with Okta positioning the acquisition as a move beyond login verification into continuous monitoring of what users, apps and autonomous software do after access is granted.
Permiso, launched from stealth in 2022 by former FireEye executives Paul Nguyen and Jason Martin, focuses on spotting attacks that exploit stolen identities inside cloud infrastructure and recently expanded into AI-agent monitoring.
April brought Permiso's SandyClaw launch to test AI agent skills in a sandbox, underscoring why identity vendors are racing to secure non-human identities as enterprises deploy AI more deeply across operations.
About $29 million had been raised by Permiso, whose April 2024 Series A valued it at roughly $80 million post-money, highlighting the premium Okta is paying to deepen its AI security push.