With increased productivity and innovative capabilities, GenAI has become the desktop betting tool for employees. Developers use it to write code, finance teams use it to analyze reports, and sales teams use it to create customer emails and assets. However, it is these capabilities that pose serious security risks.
Register for our upcoming webinar to learn how to prevent GenAI data leaks
When employees enter data into GenAI tools like ChatGPT, they often don’t distinguish between sensitive and non-sensitive data. Research on LayerX shows that one in three employees who use GenAI tools also share sensitive information. This can include source code, internal financials, business plans, IP, identifying information, customer data, and more.
Security teams have been trying to address this risk of data theft ever since ChatGPT stormed into our lives in November 2022. However, until now the general approach has been to either “allow everything” or “block everything”, ie. allow the use of GenAI without any safeguards or block the use altogether.
This approach is highly inefficient because it either opens the floodgates to risk without attempting to protect corporate data, or it prioritizes security over business benefits, causing businesses to lose out on productivity gains. In the long run, this could lead to Shadow GenAI or—even worse—a business losing its competitive edge in the marketplace.
Can organizations protect against data breaches while taking advantage of GenAI?
The answer, as always, requires both knowledge and tools.
The first step is to understand and map which of your data needs protection. Not all data must be transferred – certainly business plans and source code. But public information on your website can be safely entered into ChatGPT.
The second step is to determine the level of restrictions you want to apply to employees when they try to insert such sensitive data. This can result in a complete ban or a simple warning. Alerts are useful because they help educate employees about the importance of data risks and encourage autonomy so that employees can make their own decisions based on a balance of the type of data they are entering and their needs.
Now it’s time for the technique. The GenAI DLP tool can enforce these policies by analyzing employee activity in GenAI programs in detail and blocking or alerting employees when they try to insert sensitive data into them. Such a solution can also disable GenAI extensions and apply different policies to different users.
In a new webinar from LayerX experts, they delve into the risks of GenAI data and provide best practices and practical steps to ensure enterprise security. CISOs, security professionals, compliance departments – Register here.
