Strengthening Data Protection and Governance for AI Applications

Kunal AnandChief Product Officer

In an increasingly AI-driven world, securing data has never been more critical—or more challenging. Organizations everywhere are on an accelerated journey to deploy generative AI and other emerging technologies to transform how they work, innovate, and engage with their customers. Yet, as exciting as these possibilities are, they also come with significant complexity, particularly when it comes to data protection and governance.

AI applications are highly distributed and rely on the movement of massive amounts of data between data stores, models, and applications. Protecting this data and ensuring compliance with data privacy regulations is a significant challenge for IT and security teams. Traditional Data Loss Prevention (DLP) and Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) tools often lack real-time visibility into data flows, struggle with accurate classification, and provide limited enforcement capabilities. This leaves gaps in protection.

These gaps are a problem for any application, but AI takes the stakes to an entirely new level. Large volumes of sensitive data, whether it’s training inputs or user inputs to generative AI models, require precise visibility and policy-driven governance to ensure they don’t fall into the wrong hands or run afoul of regulations.

I’m thrilled to share that F5 is taking a significant step toward addressing these challenges. Later this year, we will add groundbreaking data protection and governance capabilities to the F5 Application Delivery and Security Platform. This will enable organizations to manage the flow of sensitive data in real time, unlock greater observability, and strengthen compliance. In short, we’re addressing the critical data protection gaps that have emerged as organizations embrace modern and AI-powered applications.

““We’re addressing the critical data protection gaps that have emerged as organizations embrace modern and AI-powered applications.””

– Kunal Anand, Chief Innovation Officer, F5

These capabilities come through our acquisition of LeakSignal, a leading provider of data governance and protection solutions. LeakSignal was recognized by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) for pioneering data classification, proactive remediation, and AI-driven policy enforcement of data in-transit.

In the coming months, this functionality will be integrated across F5 solutions to protect sensitive and proprietary data in APIs, traditional and AI applications, and at endpoints, as well as mediate data input and output for large language models (LLMs). Here is a glimpse of what you can expect:

• Real-time data classification and analysis: Organizations will be able to precisely identify what type of data is being transmitted and where it’s going, allowing them to apply policy-driven controls to manage risks effectively.
• Policy-driven enforcement and incident response: With enhanced observability, organizations can do more than just see data flow—they can control it and they can act when needed.
• Continuous monitoring and governance: Compliance isn’t a one-and-done activity. We will provide stronger oversight with ongoing auditing and monitoring of data access and transmission to ensure compliance with regulatory standards.

Through the integration of these capabilities into the F5 Application Delivery and Security Platform, we’re empowering organizations to navigate the complexities of the AI era with confidence. From protecting sensitive data in transit to ensuring compliance across multicloud environments, our solutions are designed to enable innovation without compromise. I’m excited about this next step and look forward to helping our customers build the secure, data-driven foundations needed to push the boundaries of what’s possible with AI.

About the Author

Kunal AnandChief Product Officer

Kunal Anand leads the F5 product organization as Chief Product Officer. Responsible for product vision, strategy, and execution, he ensures development of breakthrough solutions that solve critical challenges and create exceptional experiences for customers. In his previous role as Chief Technology and AI Officer, Kunal charted the company’s technology and AI strategy and vision. Prior to F5, Kunal held the dual role of Chief Technology Officer and Chief Information Security Officer at Imperva. His journey to Imperva began in 2018 with the acquisition of Prevoty, an application security startup he co-founded in 2013. Before joining Prevoty, he was the Director of Technology at BBC Worldwide. Kunal has a deep history of innovation and technical expertise, and has held roles leading security, data, technology, and engineering teams at Gravity, MySpace, and the NASA Jet Propulsion Lab. Kunal has over 15 years of experience in AI and machine learning, ranging from model training, employing AI-driven algorithms to enhance products, and designing and implementing AI architectures. Kunal holds a Bachelor of Science degree in computer science from Babson College.

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