Delinea Inc., a provider of software that helps enterprises block unauthorized access to their applications, has acquired cybersecurity startup Authomize Ltd. for an undisclosed sum.

The companies announced the deal today. Prior to the deal, Israel-based Authomize raised more than $20 million in funding from Microsoft Corp.’s M12 startup fund, Entree Capital and other backers.

Private equity firm TPG formed Delinea in 2021 by merging two cybersecurity companies, Thycotic and Centrify, it had bought earlier that year. The two acquisitions’ combined value exceeded $1.4 billion. Last February, about two years after the TPG-led merger, Delinea disclosed that its annualized recurring revenue had topped $250 million.

The company’s product portfolio consists mainly of PAM, or privileged access management, tools. Such software is used to secure administrative accounts in servers and other technology systems. Because they often have access to sensitive data, administrators require more extensive account safeguards than other employees, which is the requirement that PAM products such as Delinea’s tools help address. 

Authomize has a similar focus. It provides a platform that promises to improve the security of the user accounts in a company’s network. Unlike PAM tools, however, the platform is designed to protect the accounts of not only administrators but also other employees.

The software can automatically scan a company’s technology environment for cybersecurity risks. It’s capable of spotting, among other issues, cases where a user account has access to more applications and data than strictly necessary. Such accounts pose an unnecessarily large risk in the event they’re compromised by hackers.

Authomize’s platform uses artificial intelligence to generate remediation suggestions for the cybersecurity issues it finds. Moreover, administrators can create scripts to automatically fix the insecure user accounts the software finds. Those scripts promise to speed up tasks such as revoking unnecessary access permissions and deleting inactive accounts.

Besides configuration-related issues, Authomize’s platform can also spot other types of risks. It’s capable of detecting so-called brute force attacks, or cyberattacks in which hackers attempt to access an employee account by guessing the password. Authomize says its platform likewise mitigates the risk posed by social engineering campaigns that seek to steal employee login credentials.

Delinea will use Authomize’s technology to extend the capabilities of its PAM software. “Our joint technologies will harness continuous monitoring and deliver adaptive and broad privilege controls, all within a consolidated cloud-native platform, ensuring awareness and response to protect identities and data,” said Delinea Chief Product Officer Phil Calvin.

The company provides its flagship account security products alongside several tools designed to help companies manage secrets. Those are the passwords, encryption keys and other sensitive pieces of data that applications use to power their cybersecurity mechanisms. Delinea’s secrets management and account security products reportedly had a combined installed base of more than 10,000 organizations as of early 2022. 

Image: Authomize