Unlock data where it lies.
Make it useful for AI.
Hardshell makes your most valuable data safe to use in your AI platforms.
What Hardshell is
Hardshell is an AI data security platform. It connects enterprise data to ChatGPT, Claude, Microsoft 365 Copilot, Gemini and internal assistants without migrating it, enforces each user's existing permissions at query time, substitutes stand-ins for real identifiers before content reaches a third-party model, and records every retrieval under opaque IDs. It tests what an AI system can leak before rollout and maps each finding to MITRE ATLAS technique IDs. It deploys as a cloud service, in a private cloud, or as an offline bundle.
That is data sovereignty in practice. Sensitive data stays inside your boundary and under your jurisdiction while your teams use frontier models, and the data silos you already have can be connected to an AI knowledge base without collapsing into one open corpus.
Where does your enterprise AI leak data?
Models memorize sensitive content from training data, and AI knowledge bases surface documents users were never cleared to see. Pick an attack scenario to watch each pathway leak, and see what changes when Hardshell sits between your data and the model.
The secure foundation between your data and your AI
Your data stays in your environment. Testing, telemetry and hardening run on one foundation, so every AI workflow, from retrieval to fine-tuning, inherits the same controls.
Live-Fire Exposure Testing
Demonstrated attacks against any system that puts your data behind a model, with evidence for each finding and the MITRE ATLAS technique IDs it maps to.
Knowledge Base Telemetry and Detection
One package in the retrieval path records which chunks each query returned and for whom, flags extraction patterns across requests, and keeps content and PII inside your environment behind opaque IDs.
Dataset Hardening
When testing finds exposure, Hardshell hardens the data itself before a model touches it, at build time and at runtime.
Utility Verification
Answer quality is measured against your own benchmarks as the corpus grows, so hardening never quietly costs you performance.
Works Where Your Data Lives
Native integrations for the major AI platforms, a standard interface for self-hosted models, OpenTelemetry output, and deployment as a cloud service, in your private cloud, or as an offline bundle.
Frontier models, without handing over your data.
Sensitive, confidential and regulated information is never shared with the model provider. Your team works in the tools they already use, and gets real answers back.
Securing the Foundation of AI
Hardshell's mission is to advance data security and utility where trust matters most for AI and beyond.
Our Team
Hunter Moore, PhD
CTO
Hunter Moore, PhD
CTO & Founder
Hunter holds a Ph.D. in Systems Engineering from the University of Virginia and spent over five years advising the Department of Defense on AI security at the Joint AI Center and the CDAO. He taught a graduate AI security course at UVA and is a Senior Member of IEEE.
LinkedIn ↗
Andrew Schoka
CEO
Andrew Schoka
CEO & Co-Founder
Andrew is a former U.S. Army Cyber Warfare Officer with assignments across U.S. Cyber Command, the Cyber National Mission Force, ARCYBER, and USSOCOM. He holds an MBA from UVA Darden, an M.S. in Cybersecurity from Georgia Tech, and an M.E. in Systems Engineering from UVA.
LinkedIn ↗
Ben Cutter
Head of Engineering
Ben Cutter
Founding Staff Software Engineer
Ben spent nearly twelve years at Indeed, one of the world's largest hiring platforms, across operations, quality engineering, and software development. He holds a UVA M.E. and joined at founding in November 2025.
LinkedIn ↗
Sami Saliba
Founding AI Security Engineer
Sami Saliba
Founding AI Security Engineer
Sami leads Hardshell's data-layer and adversarial-ML work. Formerly an AI researcher at Virginia Tech's Hume Center, he has published on trusted AI in high-risk settings and joined Hardshell at founding in November 2025.
LinkedIn ↗
Andrew Stephens
Founding AI Security Scientist
Andrew Stephens
Founding AI Security Scientist
Andrew builds the statistics behind Hardshell's detection methods and joined at founding in November 2025. Previously at Generac and Rotunda Solutions, he holds a master's in Applied Statistics and Data Science from Cornell.
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Reed Cutter
Senior Software Engineer
Reed Cutter
Senior Software Engineer
Reed focuses on platform reliability and test automation after nearly nine years at Indeed across software development and quality automation roles. He holds a bachelor's from RIT and joined Hardshell in February 2026.
LinkedIn ↗
Evan Plumley
Senior Infrastructure Engineer
Evan Plumley
Senior Infrastructure Engineer
Evan spent eight years as a U.S. Army Cyber officer, including company command, before engineering roles at Black Cape and Booz Allen. He holds an M.S. from the Air Force Institute of Technology and joined Hardshell in September 2026.
LinkedIn ↗
Lauren Cappa
Chief of Staff
Lauren Cappa
Chief of Staff
Lauren spent four years in federal technology sales and data and AI strategy at GovSmart and Paragon Micro, supporting Department of Energy and DOD customers. She is VP of Publicity for AFCEA Central Virginia and joined Hardshell in September 2026.
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Hunter Oakey
AI Security Engineer
Hunter Oakey
AI Security Engineer
Hunter was a Rodman Scholar at UVA, where he studied Systems Engineering and Computer Science and pursued an M.E. through UVAccelerate. He built ML forecasting models at Pula Capital Management and joined Hardshell in September 2026.
LinkedIn ↗
Thomas Van Pelt
AI Security Data Engineering Intern
Thomas Van Pelt
AI Security Data Engineering Intern
Thomas is pursuing degrees in Systems Engineering and Computer Science at the University of Virginia. He co-founded and built Catch, a mobile app accepted into UVA Darden's i.Lab incubator, and joined Hardshell in May 2026.
LinkedIn ↗
Rohan Singh
Software Engineering Intern
Rohan Singh
Software Engineering Intern
Rohan studies Computer and Data Science at the University of Virginia. He interned at Expedia Group and Freddie Mac, was an AI/ML research assistant at UVA's Biocomplexity Institute, and joined Hardshell in September 2026.
LinkedIn ↗Our Advisors
Uday Gupta
CFO & COO, Adovate
Uday Gupta
Board of Directors
Uday is CFO and COO of Adovate, a clinical-stage pharmaceutical company, and a Professor of Practice at the University of Virginia, teaching innovation and entrepreneurship at Darden and in Systems Engineering. Over three decades he has co-founded and led ventures in biotech, agtech, and financial services and held leadership roles at Centerline Biomedical and Capital One. He holds a Darden MBA and joined Hardshell's board in September 2026.
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John Elder, PhD
Founder, Elder Research
John Elder, PhD
Advisory Board
John founded Elder Research in 1995 and built it into one of the nation's most experienced data science consultancies. He is now Vice President and Technical Fellow for Data Science at ManTech. A pioneer of ensemble modeling, he co-authored three books on data mining, ensemble methods, and text mining, two named book of the year, holds engineering degrees from Rice and UVA, and was appointed by President George W. Bush to a national panel on technology for national security.
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Matt Burkett, PhD
Assistant Professor, UVA Systems Engineering
Matt Burkett, PhD
Advisory Board
Matt is an Assistant Professor in UVA's Department of Systems and Information Engineering, where he directs the Accelerated Master's Program and researches AI, financial engineering, and decision-making under uncertainty. He spent two decades applying quantitative methods to high-stakes problems at Ankura, LOC Investment Advisers, and the CFTC, where he studied the 2010 Flash Crash. He holds a Ph.D., M.S., and B.S. from the same department.
LinkedIn ↗
Steven Lee
Founder, Rotunda Solutions
Steven Lee
Advisory Board
Steven founded Rotunda Solutions and led it as CEO before joining McKinsey & Company, where he established its U.S. Government Analytics practice and now designs adaptive decision systems for federal clients. He is an Executive Fellow for AI and Algorithmic Warfare with Air Forces Central Command, a Senior Executive Fellow at George Mason University, and a serial founder and early-stage investor. He holds an M.Eng. from UVA, where he is pursuing a Ph.D.
LinkedIn ↗Our Values
Integrity
We are transparent and principled
Trust
We invest in relationships
Respect
We are good teammates and partners
Innovation
We push the edge of what's possible
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