Palo Alto Networks EMEA Chief Calls for Faster Cybersecurity Response

Cybersecurity leaders need to prepare for attacks that unfold faster and extend beyond national borders, Helmut Reisinger, EMEA chief at Palo Alto Networks, told Swedish publication Techtidningen in an interview in Stockholm.

Reisinger said organizations should examine whether their security architecture can address future threats, how quickly they can act after detecting an incident, and whether zero trust rules cover employees, contractors, machines and AI agents. He said the time from a compromise to data theft has shortened: about four years ago it averaged roughly four days, compared with about one day now, and less than an hour in many cases.

Palo Alto Networks announced Unit 42 Continuous Frontier AI Defense at its Ignite event in Stockholm. The service uses offensive security experts and multiple AI models to find and validate exposures, and help customers address them across applications, identities, cloud infrastructure and networks. Reisinger said using several models can surface different issues, while an orchestration layer assigns tasks among them. He said the approach had been tested internally and with more than 100 companies worldwide.

He described virtual patching as a way to protect an exposed asset while an organization plans a regular software patch, which may need to wait for a maintenance window. Reisinger also cautioned against giving AI agents unlimited or permanent access, or authority to shut down production facilities or critical assets; he said permissions should be specific and time-limited.

He said large organizations often use more than 30 security tools and cited a bank with 67. For Swedish IT leaders’ next 90 days, he recommended mapping current AI use, measuring incident response times, and reviewing whether security architecture can be simplified.