AI’s rise is putting neocloud cybersecurity in focus.
- Ilya Sutskever warns neoclouds could become prime targets if rogue AI agents can autonomously replicate and hijack compute infrastructure.
- Palo Alto Networks CEO Nikesh Arora offered help.
- AI cloud growth remains explosive, with CoreWeave, Nebius and IREN posting sharp revenue gains as retail traders show a preference for IREN.
The rapid rise of AI agents is opening up a new cybersecurity risk for the companies supplying the computing power behind the AI boom, a top AI executive said.
Ilya Sutskever, co-founder of Safe Superintelligence and OpenAI, warned that neocloud providers could become prime targets if AI agents can operate autonomously and replicate themselves.
“Neoclouds have limited cybersecurity,” Sutskever said in a post on X. “Next time agents successfully go rogue, they’ll try taking over a neocloud to run more copies. This is bad.”
Sutskever called on neocloud companies to “greatly strengthen their cybersecurity” and urged companies with strong cybersecurity models to help protect the infrastructure.
Nikesh Arora, CEO of Palo Alto Networks, appeared ready to take up the challenge, replying: “Send them my way. Have a lot of stuff which I can help them with :).”
Shares of top neocloud operators CoreWeave, Nebius and IREN Ltd were down 1.3% to 1.5% in overnight trading ahead of Wednesday.
AI’s Rise Sparks Cybersecurity Debate
As AI becomes more sophisticated and capable of producing faster, more threatening hacks, the conversation around cybersecurity preparedness has gained fresh urgency.
More than 100 technology and financial companies, including OpenAI, Microsoft, Alphabet and Amazon, recently called for a stronger defensive response to AI-driven cyberattacks, highlighting how quickly the threat is evolving.
Are Neoclouds At Greater Risk?
Neocloud operators are already taking steps on the cybersecurity front. CoreWeave said security is integrated across its AI-native cloud, including identity and access management, Kubernetes and container security, encryption and network controls.
Nebius has added stronger security and compliance controls to its AI Cloud and partnered with CrowdStrike to extend enterprise-grade protection across its infrastructure.
That could make cybersecurity an increasingly important part of the neocloud investment story.
CoreWeave, Nebius, IREN Ride Growth Wave
Sutskever’s comments come as CoreWeave, IREN, and Nebius rapidly expand the infrastructure used to train and run AI models.
CoreWeave reported $2.58 billion in second-quarter revenue, up roughly 110% and ahead of estimates, while its revenue backlog climbed to $104.2 billion. The company also raised its 2026 capital spending outlook.
Nebius delivered an even sharper growth print, with second-quarter revenue jumping 454% year over year to $582.3 million. IREN, meanwhile, is accelerating its shift from bitcoin mining toward AI infrastructure and fiscal 2026 AI Cloud revenue rose nearly eightfold to $128.8 million.
For retail traders, IREN appears to be their top pick from the group. On Stocktwits, the retail sentiment was ‘bearish’ for CRWV and NBIS, and ‘extremely bullish’ for IREN.
IREN stock is down 2.5% year to date, while CRWV is up 14.3% and NBIS has gained 138%.
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