Edge security startup Huskeys Security Ltd. today added Profiling to its platform to map out which parts of a company’s web applications the business depends on.

The new capability goes after a longstanding problem at the network edge, where most large organizations run a stack of third-party security products from different vendors. Content delivery networks, bot defenses and web application firewalls each see only their own layer of traffic. Without context from the others, Huskeys argues, controls tend to end up generic, and that can mean blocking legitimate customers.

Profiling starts with the application itself. The software looks at who is calling each endpoint and what those callers, human or automated, appear to be after. The paths most important to the business get marked, as do the security controls already in place. With that profile in hand, Huskeys can judge each request by the standards of the customer’s own application.

Huskeys’ co-founder and Chief Technology Officer Roy Weisfeld said most organizations protect everything the same way, “like a mall with one security team guarding every store identically, whether it’s a luxury boutique or a snack stand.” Profiling is meant to give each store its own guard, he added.

The profile is the first stage of what Huskeys calls its Hardening Loop. The platform keeps watching a profiled path for signs of abuse, and when it finds something, the fix it recommends is the one it expects to make the most difference. Customers have to sign off before any control goes live.

The company says it then checks whether the change had the effect it was supposed to. “The customer decides; Huskeys delivers,” said Yotam Mazurik, who leads the company’s research team.

Huskeys is launching Profiling as machines take up a growing share of the traffic reaching web applications. Cloudflare Inc. Chief Executive Matthew Prince said in June that automated traffic made up more than half of requests for webpages on Cloudflare’s network.

Some of it comes from artificial intelligence agents that shop and complete transactions for their users. Security tools working from traffic signals alone have a hard time separating those agents from abusive bots.

The shrinking gap between the disclosure of a vulnerability and attacks that exploit it is another reason Huskeys gives for the launch. Security teams “have spent years trying to respond faster,” Weisfeld said. His alternative is to “understand what matters before the next incident, so you can remove the window instead of racing the clock.”

Profiling is in beta now with a limited set of customers, who need no special onboarding to start. Huskeys says results show up within hours.

Huskeys has raised $35 million, including $8 million announced at its March launch. Blackstone Inc., whose Blackstone Innovations Investments arm led a $27 million Series A round in September, also uses the product.

Image: Huskeys