The IT Nerd

Forcepoint today announced major enhancements to its AI-native Data Security Cloud platform, led by ARIA, the embedded Adaptive Risk Intelligence Assistant that uses natural language to create enforcement policies and accelerate incident response across AI-driven workflows. The company also updated its Global Partner Program, aligning incentives and enablement around Data Security Cloud to help partners deploy and scale modern data security for end-users. Together, these innovations advance Forcepoint’s Self-Aware Data Security approach that knows threats as they form, adapts policies and risk scoring in real time and enforces controls wherever data flows.

A recent World Economic Forum report found that 66 percent of organizations say AI will have the most significant impact on cybersecurity in the next year, yet most lack formal processes to assess AI risk. As AI reshapes how sensitive information is created, transformed and shared at machine speed across cloud platforms, collaboration tools and AI-driven workflows, this always-on data evolves long after creation, widening the gap between visibility and control.

Today’s Data Security Cloud updates address this gap with AI-aware automation, on-device web intelligence and a redesigned partner program that brings Self-Aware Data Security to market at scale. Rather than relying on static policies or routing traffic through a remote proxy before responding, Forcepoint adapts enforcement in real time, closing the distance between detection and action to keep up with how modern workforces leverage AI tools. 

Data Security Cloud unifies DSPM, DLP Cloud, Data Detection and Response (DDR), Web and Email security, CASB, RBI, advanced forensics and risk-adaptive protection under a single-policy framework, extending from endpoint to cloud. The platform eliminates multiple point products, making Self-Aware Data Security a practical, day-to-day reality. 

Data Security Cloud Delivers AI-Aware Protection at the Speed of Data Creation

The enhancements extend protection to follow sensitive information everywhere, across AI pipelines, analytics platforms and collaboration tools. By unifying discovery, classification, prioritization and enforcement in one continuous loop, Forcepoint enables organizations to move toward Self-Aware Data Security — gaining clarity and confidence to tame data sprawl, safely enable GenAI, contain insider risk and simplify compliance. Key innovations include:

Forcepoint Adaptive Risk Intelligence Assistant (ARIA). Embedded in Data Security Cloud, ARIA understands risk across the platform, identifying gaps such as newly adopted copilots without policy coverage, and generates recommended policies in seconds with clear rationale for administrator review. Teams can quickly create or update policies and deploy them across channels from a single interface, reducing time-to-value and policy expertise requirements. ARIA also streamlines incident response by integrating with existing tools like ServiceNow and Slack, while continuously delivering risk insights powered by Forcepoint’s AI Mesh, which discovers and classifies billions of structured and unstructured data elements.

Next-generation Data Security Everywhere agent. The new agent brings adaptive protection and web intelligence directly to the endpoint, inspecting and protecting data on devices, without forcing traffic through a traditional proxy. It manages precise protection for sanctioned AI apps while blocking sensitive information from reaching unsanctioned AI tools and personal cloud storage. It combines adaptive enforcement, investigation, forensics and user-level awareness in a single agent that supports cloud and on-premises environments, allowing organizations to modernize without sacrificing protection.

Expanded coverage for modern analytics, cloud data lakehouses and AI-driven environments. Forcepoint extended structured data security to cloud data lakehouses such as Databricks and Snowflake, deepened integration with Google Workspace and broadened consistent protection across SaaS, hybrid, endpoint, web and email channels.

Global Partner Program Accelerates Data Security Everywhere 

Based on partner feedback, Forcepoint updated its Global Partner Program to align incentives, enablement and deal structures around Data Security Cloud. The redesigned program introduces a simplified three-tier structure with transparent requirements and clearly defined economic benefits at every level, including deal registration margins with no minimum thresholds and deal families aligned to data security use cases. Expanded enablement includes billable capability development to help partners differentiate as trusted data security advisors.

Learn More at AWARE Virtual Event and RSA Conference 2026 

Forcepoint will showcase Data Security Cloud enhancements at the AWARE Spring 2026 virtual event on March 4 and during RSA Conference, March 23–26. Both forums will feature real-world use cases and a closer look at the innovations announced today. Register to access on-demand AWARE content at forcepoint.com/aware. RSA attendees can request in-person meetings and demos.

To learn more about Forcepoint Data Security Cloud, read the announcement blog and visit the platform page. More details about the Global Partner Program can be found on this blog and the partner page.

a new research blog post published today by Forcepoint’s X-Labs threat research team that uncovers a highly evasive phishing campaign abusing trusted cloud storage and PDF files to harvest user credentials.

In the blog post — “Fake Dropbox Phishing Campaign via PDF and Cloud Storage” — X-Labs Sr. Security Researcher Prashant Kumar details how attackers are now using multi-stage delivery techniques that evade traditional email, content and link scanning by:

• Sending a seemingly benign PDF attachment via a business-themed email that bypasses standard filters.
• Hosting a secondary PDF on a legitimate cloud infrastructure to exploit trust in “safe” services.
• Redirecting users to a spoofed Dropbox login page designed to steal credentials and deliver them to attacker-controlled infrastructure.

This research highlights how trusted file types and cloud platforms are being weaponized to bypass security controls — a significant shift from traditional phishing vectors and an emerging concern for enterprises and users alike.

You can read the research here: Dropbox PDF Phishing Abuse of Trusted Cloud Storage

Today, Forcepoint’s X-Labs Threat Research team released a new blog highlighting a central topic: “Online Casino Spam: How Fake Gambling Sites Steal Financial Data.”

The research uncovers a new type of online casino scam gaining prominence in Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia and Turkey. It outlines the tactics spammers are using, how the scam is carried out, tips for identifying legitimate activity and a statement on how Forcepoint customers are protected.

A few quick takeaways that may be helpful for anything you are working on tied to this emerging topic:

• Deceptive lures: Use of high-reputation domains and legitimate cloud services to bypass email filters.
• Data harvesting: Stealing personal info and credit card details via fake registration forms.
• Multi-stage scams: Casino hooks frequently lead to fraudulent investment schemes or “pig butchering” scams.
• Infrastructure sharing: Attackers use the same backend servers for various types of financial fraud.
• Dynamic redirection: Links use geo-targeting to show victims localized scams based on their IP address.
• Evasion tactics: Use of URL shorteners and HTML smuggling to hide malicious destinations from security tools.
• Lead generation: Active users are logged and sold to other cybercriminal groups for future targeting.

The piece is available at:https://www.forcepoint.com/blog/x-labs/online-casino-spam-financial-scams.

Forcepoint today announced Eva Klein has joined the company as Chief Customer Officer. Klein will lead Forcepoint’s global customer success organization, overseeing onboarding, adoption, retention and long-term value realization as customers operationalize data security in the AI era. She reports to Rick Hanson, President of Go-to-Market.

As sensitive data moves across cloud platforms, SaaS applications, endpoints and AI-driven workflows, organizations face mounting pressure to turn security investment into measurable outcomes. Agentic AI and the rapid growth of synthetic data are accelerating how data is created, shared and reused, often beyond traditional controls. Visibility alone is not enough; customers need confidence that insight leads to action and that protections adapt as risk and regulatory demands change for enterprises and governments.

Forcepoint’s AI-native Data Security Cloud helps organizations identify sensitive data in context, understand how it is accessed and shared and adapt protection in real-time through a unified, single-policy framework. The platform is built to close the visibility-to-control gap facing organizations as they scale AI adoption to support back-office processes, infrastructure management, vibe coding and beyond.

With more than 25 years of experience spanning customer success, partner enablement and sales, Klein will focus on strengthening the customer journey as a continuous loop of ‘always-on’ operational excellence.  Most recently, she served as Vice President of Global Customer Success at Mimecast, where she led global teams focused on customer retention, value delivery and operational scale. Prior to Mimecast, she held senior customer leadership roles including Vice President of Customer Success at HubSpot and Vice President of Customer Experience at Rapid7, building and leading organizations through periods of rapid growth and platform expansion.

Today Forcepoint published its latest post in its 2026 Future Insights series: “Agentic AI: Securing a New Generation of Digital Actors.”

The blog highlights that the shift to Agentic AI, autonomous systems that can plan, decide, and act across business environments, challenges the core assumptions of current cybersecurity practices. This will require a fundamental reset in how organizations approach digital risk, as traditional, human-centric security playbooks fall short of protecting these new digital actors.
A few quick takeaways that may be helpful for anything you are working on tied to this emerging topic:

• Agentic AI systems are not deterministic. They act like digital people but lack human intuition, ethics, and context, making traditional, rule-based security insufficient.
• The attack surface is changing. Security teams must secure not just human-to-data interactions, but also agent-to-data and agent-to-agent interactions.
• Chained Agent Manipulation is a new threat. An attacker can manipulate one agent in a workflow to compromise the entire downstream sequence of decisions and actions—a new form of social engineering designed for digital actors.
• New skills and roles are required. Organizations will need dedicated AI risk exposure professionals to map data flows and evaluate reasoning chains in these complex systems.
• Behavioral monitoring is key. Protection needs to focus on behavioral monitoring, anomaly detection, and guardrails that intervene when agents drift into unsafe territory.

This perspective can support pieces on:

• The future of AI-driven cyber-attacks (e.g., chained manipulation)
• The limits of traditional security in autonomous AI environments
• Emerging CISO challenges in 2026 and beyond
• The evolution of data security practices (e.g., DSPM/DDR)The need for new professional roles (AI Risk Exposure Professionals)

The post is available at: https://www.forcepoint.com/blog/x-labs/agentic-ai-risk.

Forcepoint today announced John Sorensen has joined the company as Senior Vice President of Americas Sales. He will focus on field execution, strengthening partner engagement and aligning closely with customer priorities while reshaping the Americas sales organization for how data is protected today in the AI era. Sorensen will report to Rick Hanson, President of Go-to-Market.

Organizations face a widening visibility-to-control gap as sensitive data moves fluidly across tools, teams and formats — generated by AI automation, shared in documents and collaboration apps, or pulled into analyses far from where it began. Traditional tools may detect a risky action forming but often cannot respond quickly or accurately enough to prevent a breach or compliance failure. As data becomes both a catalyst for innovation and a growing source of exposure, customers need clearer, more immediate ways to intervene, not simply observing when risk emerges.

Forcepoint’s AI-native data security approach closes that gap by helping customers identify sensitive data in context, understand how it is being used, evaluate intent and risk signals, and automate protection within a unified, single-policy framework. Delivered through Forcepoint’s Data Security Cloud, recent advances in deep discovery, classification, risk scoring and continuous protection enable organizations to translate visibility into accurate and precise control across modern enterprises and government environments.

Sorensen brings more than three decades of security and technology leadership to Forcepoint. He most recently served as Vice President of Global Sales for Data Security at Entrust. He also brings prior Forcepoint leadership experience, having previously served as the company’s Vice President of Global Sales Strategy and Execution —perspective that strengthens continuity at a time when customers are reassessing data protection. Earlier in his career, he held executive roles at Symantec, RSA Security and McAfee, with responsibilities spanning revenue strategy, channel expansion and leading high-performing sales teams. 

Security leaders and analysts researching actionable strategies to manage AI-driven data risks can access on-demand sessions from AWARE 2025, Forcepoint’s annual virtual user conference on AI and data risk. 

This morning Forcepoint has published its next post in its 2026 Future Insights series:“AI Technical Debt: The Silent Cybersecurity Crisis.” 

The piece argues that AI technical debt is rapidly becoming one of the most dangerous – and least recognized – drivers of data risk as enterprises accelerate AI adoption. Instead of being a pure engineering concern, Forcepoint notes that this “silent buildup” is already shaping the next wave of breaches.

A few quick takeaways that may be helpful for anything you are working on tied to this topic:

• AI accelerates existing technical debt. Rushed integrations and legacy connectors quietly expand the attack surface as organizations adopt AI at speed.
• Debt creates data blind spots. Misconfigurations, outdated connectors and incomplete governance leave sensitive data unclassified, overshared or exposed.
• Traditional tools can’t see these risks. Many AI-related misconfigurations occur in places firewalls, SIEMs and endpoint tools don’t monitor.
• DSPM is becoming essential. Continuous discovery, classification and posture management are emerging as the most effective controls for AI-era data risk.

This perspective can support pieces on:

• AI and data security risk trends
• The limits of traditional tools in cloud/SaaS environments
• DSPM / DDR adoption
• The role of technical debt behind recent breaches and misconfigurations
• How CISOs are trying to keep AI innovation and governance aligned

You can read the post here:  https://www.forcepoint.com/blog/x-labs/ai-technical-debt

 Forcepoint has announced the expansion of its Self-Aware Data Security platform to protect enterprise databases and structured data sources. With this launch, Forcepoint is the first to extend AI Mesh Data Classification technology across both structured and unstructured data throughout the hybrid enterprise, delivering unified Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) and adaptive data loss prevention in a single platform.

As enterprises accelerate SaaS, cloud and AI adoption, structured data remains a critical blind spot. Databases and data lakes house customer records, financial assets and intellectual property but have lacked consistent visibility and policy enforcement alongside files, emails and SaaS apps. By extending AI Mesh Data Classification to structured sources, Forcepoint enables organizations to discover, classify and remediate risks in real time with a single-policy framework.

With Forcepoint DSPM, enterprises and government agencies can discover and classify regulated and proprietary information across databases, data lakes and files, track its movement and apply safeguards in real time, without manual queries or fragmented tools. This automation is enabled by Forcepoint’s AI-native approach to Self-Aware Data Security, which unifies visibility and enforcement in a continuous loop, making security responsive and adaptive, not static.

A Self-Aware Approach to Data Security 

Self-Aware Data Security is Forcepoint’s AI-native strategy that turns risk visibility into protection. Rather than separating discovery from enforcement, it creates a continuous, adaptive loop, analyzing context, posture and intent, while discovering sensitive data, classifying it, prioritizing risks, remediating exposures, and protecting information across all environments, everywhere people work today. The result is security that knows, adapts and protects automatically as data moves — for example, coaching users in real-time, adjusting access or blocking attempts to share sensitive data externally.

Powered by AI Mesh, Forcepoint delivers precise, explainable and customizable data discovery and classification, while a single-policy framework applies consistent prioritization, remediation and protection. In this self-aware architecture, data is governed consistently at rest, in use, and in motion, closing gaps legacy tools leave behind.

With the Forcepoint DSPM expansion, organizations can simplify security, reduce risk and cost, and accelerate AI and cloud initiatives with confidence. Leaders gain insight into where data resides, how it’s accessed and what risks it carries, all in a single, unified system. Compliance teams benefit from nearly 2,000 policy templates, automated reporting and explainable, auditable AI, making it easier to keep pace with complex regulations. Employees work without disruption, knowing sensitive information is protected wherever it moves. 

How Forcepoint DSPM Closes Gaps in Controlling AI and Data Risk:

• Structured Data Discovery and Classification. Extends Forcepoint’s industry-leading discovery and classification to Microsoft SQL, Oracle, MySQL and other enterprise databases and data lakes like Databricks and Snowflake, unifying risk management across structured and unstructured data.
• Precise Enforcement and Remediation at Scale. Beyond visibility, admins can adjust file permissions, prevent oversharing, move sensitive files to secure repositories, or clean up redundant, outdated or trivial (ROT) data. Integration with a single-policy framework applies controls across SaaS, email, websites, networks, endpoints, clouds and AI workflows.
• Enterprise-Ready Compliance. AI Mesh delivers more accurate, customizable and explainable classification than generic LLM tools. Integration between policy templates, automated reporting and transparent AI logic streamlines compliance and audit readiness while reducing false positives.
• Executive Risk Visibility. Dashboards surface high-level trends in regulated data exposure, helping leaders prioritize mitigation with less overhead.
• Financial-Impact Estimates. An industry-first capability estimates breach or compliance costs, helping leaders prioritize remediation and data access governance. 

Forcepoint AWARE 2025, Oct. 7-8

Forcepoint’s premier AI data security user conference is a two-day virtual summit providing actionable strategies to safely adopt AI innovations. With high-profile speakers, a dynamic agenda and tailored breakout sessions, attendees will explore how to control AI workflows, simplify compliance, and transform security into a competitive advantage. Register today to attend live or access content on-demand.

To learn more about Forcepoint DSPM, visit the product page, data risk assessment page, or read the blog Forcepoint DSPM Adds Structured Data Support.