Shadow AI threats - the new frontline of cyber risk

Artificial Intelligence (AI) did not arrive in your organisation through a board decision or a formal security review. It crept in quietly, through emails written faster, code generated on the fly, workflows automated in the background and support teams leaning on tools that feel harmless.

- John McLoughlin

This is how Shadow AI takes hold, not as a project, but as behaviour. And that is exactly why it has become one of the most dangerous risks most businesses are carrying today.

What is Shadow AI

Shadow AI refers to any AI system operating without security oversight, approval or governance. It includes employees using tools like ChatGPT, Copilot, Perplexity or Claude for client work. It includes AI features silently embedded inside SaaS platforms.

It includes teams training internal models on company data without understanding where that data goes. It includes external AI agents with excessive access and bots that can read sensitive information, send emails, create files or delete them entirely. These systems are productive, efficient and largely invisible. And invisibility is where risk lives.

AI-enabled attack tactics