A conference in Las Vegas highlighted the cyber risks of AI. Several stocks hit new highs.

Shares of cybersecurity companies CrowdStrike and Palo Alto Networks rose 5% and 5.8%, respectively, at the close of trading on August 10, setting new all-time highs. Investors have once again turned their attention to companies developing tools to protect against AI-related threats following the annual Black Hat conference in Las Vegas, according to CNBC.

The most common theme in conversations with partners, suppliers, and customers was that AI agents have “fundamentally changed the threat landscape,” BTIG analysts told CNBC. AI agents have already become a major cybersecurity threat, while the implementation of tools to defend against them is still in its early stages, they added.

BTIG raised its price target for Palo Alto Networks shares to $380, which is 1.3% below Monday’s closing price. According to analysts, the company’s identity management platform will benefit from the proliferation of AI agents, and its products create a data-driven “moat” in other cybersecurity segments.

The target price for cybersecurity software developer CrowdStrike has been raised to $237 per share, implying growth potential of approximately 5%. “AI is driving a new cycle of modernization in the endpoint security segment, which directly benefits CrowdStrike’s core business,” wrote BTIG analysts.

Against this backdrop, shares of other companies in the sector also rose: Rubrik gained nearly 9%, reaching its highest level since June 2025, while SentinelOne shares rose by just under 4%, climbing to their highest level since February 2025. Netscope and Zscaler shares ended the day up about 5%, while SailPoint shares rose 4%.

"AI has evolved from a standalone cybersecurity feature into a key component of cyberattacks and the infrastructure used by both attackers and defenders," CNBC quotes analysts at Cantor as saying.

This article was AI-translated and verified by a human editor