Who AI search surfaces for cybersecurity
Cybersecurity AI retrieval is brand-led: 50% of unique domains are vendors, with SentinelOne surfaced in 3 of 5 queries
| # | Domain | Type | Queries | Mean pos. |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | sentinelone.com | Brand | 3/5 | 2 |
| 2 | crowdstrike.com | Brand | 2/5 | 2.5 |
| 3 | exabeam.com | Brand | 2/5 | 4 |
| 4 | huntress.com | Brand | 1/5 | 3.5 |
| 5 | security.org | Aggregator | 1/5 | 4 |
| 6 | cybernews.com | Editorial | 1/5 | 8.5 |
| 7 | gartner.com | Aggregator | 1/5 | 1 |
| 8 | paloaltonetworks.com | Brand | 1/5 | 1 |
| 9 | microsoft.com | Brand | 1/5 | 1 |
| 10 | kaseya.com | Brand | 1/5 | 2 |
| 11 | fortinet.com | Brand | 1/5 | 2 |
| 12 | techradar.com | Editorial | 1/5 | 2 |
“Queries” = how many of the 5 sampled queries surfaced this domain in the top 10 (across 3 samples). Position is the mean rank when present.
Brand domains make up 50.0% of unique domains surfaced (19 of 38), aggregators 42.1% (16 of 38), and editorial just 7.9% (3 of 38). By pooled appearances (counting every result slot), brands hold 53.3%, aggregators 37.8%, editorial 8.9%. This makes cybersecurity an outlier relative to the global dataset, where aggregators claim 30.4% of unique domains and editorial 21.0%. In cybersecurity, vendor-published content (product comparison pages, glossary explainers, SIEM tool roundups) is crowding out independent editorial at an unusual rate, while aggregators like Gartner and security.org still hold strong footholds on specific query types (enterprise evaluation and consumer antivirus respectively).
SentinelOne (brand) is the most consistently surfaced domain, appearing in 3 of the 5 queries with a mean position of 2.0 across 9 result appearances. CrowdStrike (brand) follows in 2 of 5 queries with a mean position of 2.5, and Exabeam (brand) also appears in 2 of 5 at a mean position of 4.0. Only 3 of the 38 unique domains appeared in more than one query, meaning the leaderboard beyond SentinelOne and CrowdStrike is highly query-specific: Gartner (aggregator) and Palo Alto Networks (brand) each top individual queries but are absent from others.
The retrieval pool here is unusually hospitable to vendor-published educational content, but the competition is your direct rivals, not just review sites. SentinelOne's exabeam.com-style presence (a CrowdStrike vs SentinelOne comparison page on Exabeam's domain) is the concrete playbook: publish comparison and explainer content (SIEM tools, endpoint security head-to-heads) on your own domain using the vocabulary of the queries that matter. Aggregator slots are concentrated in two distinct sub-intents: enterprise analyst coverage (Gartner for 'top SIEM tools') and consumer/SMB antivirus buying guides (security.org, cybernews.com). If you are an SMB-focused vendor, earning a placement in security.org's business antivirus roundup is the single highest-leverage third-party target in this snapshot; if you compete at enterprise, Gartner peer-review presence is the equivalent. With only 5 queries sampled, treat this as directional orientation for where to invest content and PR effort, not a final competitive map.
Methodology & limits: This vertical covers 5 queries out of a 150-query, 30-vertical dataset. Five queries surface a snapshot of the retrieval landscape, not a complete picture. The leaderboardStrength is rated 'strong' (meanJaccardTop10 = 1.0), meaning the same top-10 domains recurred stably across repeated samples of the same queries, so the relative rankings within this query set are reliable. However, 5 queries cannot represent the full breadth of cybersecurity buyer intent. Sub-categories like cloud security, zero-trust, or identity management were not sampled here and likely produce different retrieval landscapes.
- best endpoint security software for business
- top SIEM tools 2026
- CrowdStrike vs SentinelOne
- cybersecurity software for small business
- cheapest antivirus software for business
Which types of sites does AI search retrieve most often for cybersecurity buying queries?
In a 5-query snapshot of cybersecurity commercial intent, brand-owned vendor sites make up 50.0% of unique domains in the retrieval pool and 53.3% of all result appearances. Aggregator and review sites account for 42.1% of unique domains (37.8% pooled), while editorial outlets are a small minority at 7.9% unique. This is notably more brand-dominant than the broader 30-vertical dataset, where brands average 48.6% of unique domains and editorial is much larger at 21.0%.
What does a high Jaccard score mean for this vertical's AI retrieval stability?
The meanJaccardTop10 for cybersecurity is 1.0, the maximum possible, indicating that repeated sampling of these 5 queries returns an identical top-10 result set each time. In practice this means the retrieval landscape is locked-in and stable, not shifting day to day, so earning a consistent presence in these results is likely to compound over time rather than fluctuate.
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