Fortinet’s Virtue AI Deal Bolsters Agentic AI Security

Ken Xie, Founder and CEO of Fortinet | Credit: Fortinet

Fortinet acquires Virtue AI to strengthen runtime protection and automated validation for AI systems as enterprises scale deployment of agents and models

Fortinet has acquired Virtue AI, a company that provides runtime protection and automated validation for AI systems.

The transaction adds capabilities in autonomousAI security to Fortinet's existing portfolio.

According to Gartner, the AI security market could grow from US$2.8bn in 2026 to US$16.4bn by 2030.

The deal positions Fortinet to address security requirements as enterprises deploy AI agents and models across their operations.

AI deployments now involve prompts, models, agents, Model Context Protocol tools, API calls and infrastructure components that require monitoring and governance.

Fortinet acquires Virtue AI | Credit: Fortinet/LinkedIn

Ken Xie, Founder, Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer of Fortinet, says: "AI is fundamentally changing enterprise computing and security must evolve just as quickly.

"Virtue AI's technology will advance our vision for continuous AI assurance, helping customers govern and protect AI systems throughout their lifecycle while operating them confidently at enterprise scale."

Protecting AI at runtime

Fortinet launched FortiAIGate earlier this year to protect LLMs from prompt injection, data leakage, model poisoning and resource consumption issues.

Virtue AI extends protection across AI models, applications and agentic systems from development to runtime.

Its Guardian Agent capability provides visibility into AI agents and their tools. Organisations can identify unsanctioned AI applications and agents, scan MCP tools and source code for vulnerabilities, monitor agent behaviour and block tool calls before execution.

Sohaib Shaikh, CEO at Virtue AI | Credit: Sohaib Shaikh/LinkedIn

Sohaib Shaikh, Chief Executive Officer at Virtue AI, says on LinkedIn: "AI agents and models have quickly spread across the enterprise – embedded in workflows, handling sensitive data, and making real decisions. But security has been an afterthought and attackers have noticed.

"AI-native attacks – prompt injections hidden in emails or manipulative prompts that bypass your safeguards – require an entirely new class of defence.

"One built for AI, not bolted on after the fact. That's exactly what Virtue AI has built from the ground up."

Testing autonomous agent systems

Virtue AI tests autonomous agents across more than 50 sandboxed environments and 14 domains.

The platform simulates attacks like prompt injection and MCP-based exploitation against agent frameworks to map risks.

Continuous validation identifies new risks after model updates and policy changes.

Automated red-teaming covers hundreds of attack vectors and more than 1,000 risk categories, with multimodal testing and on-demand reporting for security, risk and compliance teams.

AI-native attacks – prompt injections hidden in emails or manipulative prompts that bypass your safeguards – require an entirely new class of defence

Sohaib Shaikh, CEO at Virtue AI

Real-time guardrails enable organisations to enforce policies across text, images, video, audio and AI-generated code.

Such controls are designed to prevent harmful content, sensitive data, jailbreaks and vulnerable code from reaching users or systems.

Fortinet says the acquisition complements FortiAIGate and adds automated validation and real-time protection capabilities.