Autessa vs Azure AI Prompt Shields
An alternative to Azure AI Prompt Shields for AI agents
Prompt Shields, part of Azure AI Content Safety, detects user prompt attacks and hidden instructions in documents. On its own the API returns a result for your app to act on, and Foundry guardrails can block for agents built in Foundry Agent Service. Autessa covers injection too, then adds what happens next: verification, approvals, voice checks and data limits.
Side by side
Autessa AI Agent Firewall vs Azure AI Prompt Shields
| CAPABILITY | Autessa AI Agent Firewall | Azure AI Prompt Shields |
|---|---|---|
| Applies to | Autessa agents, plus your apps by API | Foundry agents; API detects only |
| Actions for an agent | Flag, verify, hold or block | Annotate and block |
| Held tool calls an admin approves or rejects | Included | Not listed |
| Verify the person before a sensitive tool runs | Included | Not listed |
| Word of the day and duress word | Included | Not listed |
| Cloned-voice score on every caller utterance | Included | Not listed |
| Sensitive-record limits per person per day | Included | Not listed |
| Allowed sites for outbound data | Included | Egress controls, hosted agents (preview) |
| Alerts that learn each person’s normal requests | Included | Not listed |
| Full headless access (Autessa MCP) | ✓ | REST API; MCP not listed |
| 100% customizable, code and all (Autobot) | ✓ | Guardrail controls and blocking levels |
| Direct prompt injection detection | ✓ | ✓ |
| Injection hidden in documents | ✓ | Document attacks |
| Injection in tool results | ✓ | Tool response (preview) |
Based on publicly available information as of November 2026. Product names are trademarks of their owners.
Where Autessa wins
Why teams choose Autessa over Azure AI Prompt Shields
Works beyond one agent service
Foundry guardrails apply to Foundry Agent Service agents. Autessa covers Autessa agents on every channel and any app you build, through one API that returns an action.
A held tool call goes to a person
A flagged injection makes later outbound tool calls wait, and an admin approves or rejects them on the alerts page, instead of a plain block.
One request from Claude
Through the Autessa MCP, Claude or your own agent can read this week’s alerts, pull catches by agent and run the simulator, with no Azure resources or SDK code to set up.
Change more than settings
Azure lets you pick controls and blocking levels. Autobot can add a check of your own, change who approves what or rework a screen, and your developers can edit the code.
Trying it
Evaluate on your own traffic, risk-free
- Turn the firewall on in Monitor. Nothing changes for your users.
- Run the attack simulator against your most sensitive agent or API policy.
- Read a week of alerts and the dashboard side by side with your current tool.
- Tune thresholds and rules, then switch to Enforce.
FAQ
Autessa and Azure AI Prompt Shields
Is Autessa AI Agent Firewall an alternative to Azure Prompt Shields?
Yes. Both detect direct and indirect prompt injection. Autessa also covers verification, approvals, voice, duress and data limits, and works outside Azure.
Does Prompt Shields block an attack by itself?
In the Content Safety API, it returns a detection and your application decides what to do. In Foundry, guardrails can block. Autessa applies your chosen action for you in either setup.
How much of the firewall can I customize?
All of it. Thresholds, rules and exceptions are settings, and the app itself can be changed down to its code by Autobot from a plain-language request or by your developers.
Can Claude or another agent use the firewall through MCP?
Yes. The Autessa MCP exposes the firewall’s data and actions to Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor and your own agents, within the access of whoever connected it.
Can I run Autessa alongside Azure AI Prompt Shields?
Yes. Start Autessa in Monitor mode, which records what it would do without changing anything, and compare results on your own traffic before deciding.
Does Autessa work with agents not built on Autessa?
Yes, through the AI Application Firewall API, which inspects each phase of each turn of your own application.
See what it catches on your traffic.
Monitor mode changes nothing for your users. Turn it on and compare.
Starts in Monitor · nothing changes for your customers until you enforce
100% customizable, code and all
Make Autessa AI Agent Firewall fully your own.
Use it out of the box, then change anything. Ask Autobot, Autessa’s AI builder, for a new field, screen, report, workflow or agent and it builds it into your copy of the app. Or open the code and edit it yourself. Nothing is locked: the app, its data and its code are yours.
Start free and make it yours