MCP Security: The Current Situation
Red Hat, Wednesday, February 25th, 2026
The Model Context Protocol (MCP) is an open protocol designed to standardize how large language models (LLMs) connect to external tools, APIs, and data sources. Rather than relying on ad hoc, model-specific integrations, MCP defines a structured client-server architecture that allows AI applications to request context and invoke tools in a more consistent and interoperable way.
This abstraction layer is becoming more important as enterprises move beyond isolated chat interfaces toward AI systems that must integrate with ticketing platforms, code repositories, CI/CD pipelines, knowledge bases, cloud services, and more. MCP offers a shared interface for using tools and sharing data, which makes it easier to connect systems, allowing improvements in portability, and helps build scalable AI-driven automation.