New intent-based, integrated email architecture and AI-driven data access governance capabilities strengthen protection across collaboration and data environments
- Integrated model brings Secure Email Gateway and API-based deployments into a unified security architecture to reduce SOC friction.
- New AI data access governance capabilities provide comprehensive visibility into human, non-human, and AI agent access to sensitive data, with automated remediation of risky access.
- AI-native DSPM capabilities expand intelligent data discovery and classification across hybrid, cloud, and now including on-premises environments.
SUNNYVALE, Calif. and RSAC Conference 2026, San Francisco – March 23, 2026 – Proofpoint, Inc., a leading cybersecurity and compliance company, today announced innovations across its Collaboration Security and Data Security portfolios, strengthening protection for the agentic workspace—where people and AI agents interact across communication and data environments to execute business-critical work.
As organizations deploy AI assistants and autonomous agents, they are delegating authority at scale. AI systems now draft communications, access sensitive data, and take action at machine speed. Unlike deterministic systems built on fixed rules, AI generates outcomes based on prediction rather than certainty. This shift changes the enterprise risk model, where verifying identity and enforcing static access controls are no longer sufficient. Security teams must understand how activity unfolds across communication, how data is accessed, and whether behavior aligns with legitimate business intent.
Email remains the primary entry point for cyberattacks, giving threat actors a foothold to move across systems and access sensitive data. As AI agents accelerate the scale and speed of data interactions, organizations face growing challenges in maintaining visibility and control. Proofpoint connects layered email defense, AI-driven data access governance, and hybrid data visibility within a single platform, helping security teams reduce blind spots, strengthen behavioral insight, and act on risk with greater precision and less operational friction.
Strengthening Collaboration Security Across Email
Proofpoint is bringing together its two market-leading email security approaches—Secure Email Gateway (SEG) and API-based protection—into a single, integrated architecture. Each is a complete, enterprise-grade solution in its own right. Together, they create a coordinated protection model in which SEG secures north-south traffic at the perimeter, while API-based protection extends defense to east-west internal email activity. Shared threat intelligence and behavioral signals flow across pre-delivery and post-delivery controls to improve detection over time, while a unified workbench provides customers a single place to manage protection across inbound, outbound, and internal email.
Organizations gain expanded coverage for internal-to-internal compromise and direct send vulnerabilities, an increasingly exploited attack path in cloud environments. Correlating detection insights across layers provides deeper visibility into anomalous activity, whether from compromised accounts or automated agents operating within collaboration systems. An integrated administrative experience streamlines policy management, investigation, and response, reducing console switching and analyst fatigue.
“Email remains the front door to the enterprise, especially in environments where people and AI agents act on shared information,” said Tom Corn, executive vice president and general manager, Threat Protection Group at Proofpoint. “As organizations delegate more operational decisions to AI systems, security must connect signals across detection layers to understand not just isolated events, but patterns of behavior and underlying intent. We’re advancing collaboration security to reflect how work actually happens, protecting both human users and AI agents operating inside the same communication fabric. Only Proofpoint brings this level of integrated, end-to-end email security to market to deliver 99.999% detection efficacy.”
Governing Data Access Across Humans and AI Agents
Proofpoint’s AI Data Access Governance capabilities provide unified visibility into who and what can access sensitive data across SaaS, cloud, and on-prem environments, spanning human users, service accounts, and AI agents. Security teams can identify stale entitlements, orphaned accounts, and over-permissioned access, while automated remediation workflows reduce exposure without manual, ticket-driven processes.
By correlating identity activity, data sensitivity, access patterns, data loss prevention (DLP) signals, and risk indicators within the Data Security Graph, organizations move beyond static discovery toward continuous risk reduction, prioritizing governance decisions based on behavioral context and inferred intent rather than entitlement lists alone.
Extending AI-Native DSPM Across Hybrid Environments
As AI becomes embedded in business processes, sensitive data increasingly flows between legacy systems and cloud applications. Without consistent discovery and classification models, security teams lack the context needed to govern how both people and AI agents interact with that data.
To address persistent hybrid blind spots, Proofpoint is extending its AI-native Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) capabilities to on-premises environments, delivering intelligent data discovery and classification across the full enterprise environment. Organizations gain consistent visibility into sensitive data regardless of where it resides. This expansion supports more accurate risk prioritization and reduces exposure created by fragmented tooling across cloud and on-prem systems.
“Data risk no longer sits in one place. It moves across cloud services, on-prem systems, human users, and AI agents,” said Mayank Chaudhary, executive vice president and general manager, Data Security Group at Proofpoint. “We’re bringing data access governance and hybrid DSPM together within a single platform so organizations can see where sensitive data lives, understand who and what can access it, and take action based on meaningful behavioral signals. In the AI era, data governance ultimately depends on understanding not only the access, but also the intent behind it.”
Availability
These capabilities are expected to become available in Q2 2026, with timing subject to standard product rollout considerations and regional availability.
About Proofpoint, Inc.
Proofpoint, Inc. is a global leader in human- and agent-centric cybersecurity, securing how people, data and AI agents connect across email, cloud and collaboration tools. Proofpoint is a trusted partner to over 80 of the Fortune 100, over 10,000 large enterprises, and millions of smaller organizations in stopping threats, preventing data loss, and building resilience across people and AI workflows. Proofpoint’s collaboration and data security platform helps organizations of all sizes protect and empower their people while embracing AI securely and confidently. Learn more at www.proofpoint.com.
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