What is Shadow AI ?
The biggest AI risk in your organization may not be a hacker. It might be a well-intentioned employee.
For years, CISOs have been worried about Shadow IT. Today, I believe Shadow AI is becoming a far bigger challenge.
Employees are using ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Copilot, and dozens of AI tools every day. Most organizations have no visibility into what data is being uploaded, which AI tools are being used, where company information is being stored, or how AI-generated content is being reused.
The reality is that AI adoption is happening much faster than AI governance. And that’s where the risk lies.
This is not about employees doing something wrong
In fact, most are simply trying to work smarter and move faster.
The challenge is that a well-intentioned employee can unknowingly expose sensitive business information, customer data, source code, strategic plans, or intellectual property to platforms that sit completely outside the organization’s security controls.
We spent years building controls around cloud adoption. Now we need to build similar controls around AI adoption.
The question is no longer whether employees are using AI. They already are.
The real question is: do you know where AI is being used inside your organization today?
Instincts built hunting signals at sea, sharpened for two decades against digital adversaries. Not machine-written. Machine-proofread, comma by comma. Everything else, the noticing, the arguing, the getting it wrong sometimes, is mine. The bytes are for everyone; the opinions are only ever mine.
“Until the lion learns how to write, every story will glorify the hunter.” This is the lion's version.