Real-time threat intelligence enforcement at wire speed

Centripetal is one of the most mature players in AI-enhanced cybersecurity, rooted in a philosophy of proactive defense at internet scale. Founded in 2009, the company has spent more than a decade refining a real-time threat prevention model that contrasts sharply with the reactive paradigms that dominate much of the industry. Rather than relying on traditional signature-based detection — an approach too slow and too narrow for modern threat volumes — Centripetal’s technology continuously ingests and operationalizes vast collections of global threat intelligence. The company’s patented enforcement engines can block millions of risks before they ever reach protected networks, shifting cybersecurity from damage control to preemptive neutralization.

The company’s flagship CleanINTERNET service exemplifies this approach, transforming threat feeds into instant, actionable defenses without requiring expensive in-house analysis or security personnel. Complementary offerings like CleanDNS extend this protection to domain-level controls using multi-provider threat intelligence to prevent access to malicious or harmful content.

Centripetal has also expanded into operational technology environments, securing factory-floor protocols and industrial systems where downtime and compromise carry outsized consequences. By automating threat enforcement and providing immediate response capabilities across large, heterogeneous networks, Centripetal enables organizations — from enterprises to critical infrastructure operators — to achieve a level of defensive precision that was previously impractical.

Centripetal has reportedly raised $8 million, but its investment history isn’t quite clear. The company has aggressively fought to protect its patent rights since being founded in 2009 and successfully won a $151 million verdict against Palo Alto Networks. Centripetal won an even larger verdict ($2 billion+) against Cisco, but it was ultimately overturned on appeal because of the judge’s notable conflicts of interest.