08.08.2025
Are Your Employees Breaking the Law by Using AI?
Why shadow AI use is the corporate risk no one wants to talk about.
You probably have employees using ChatGPT at work right now. They might be summarizing a contract, rewriting emails, or analyzing client data. Maybe they even paid for the subscription themselves.
It feels efficient. Productive. Smart.
It might also be illegal ...
As generative AI tools sweep across the workplace, organisations are facing a silent crisis: shadow AI usage. Employees are uploading sensitive material—internal documents, personal data, customer information—into third-party platforms with vague terms of service, zero governance, and servers you don’t control.
That’s not innovation.
That’s a compliance risk.
Under laws like GDPR and industry-specific regulations, companies are obligated to know where data is processed, who can access it, and how it’s used. If an employee uploads personal information—about customers, patients, colleagues—to a public AI tool without approval, the consequences aren’t theoretical. They’re financial, legal, and reputational.
And it’s happening everywhere.
At Advania, we speak with clients who are just starting to “explore” AI—only to find their teams have already embedded it deep into daily workflows. Not maliciously. Not even recklessly. Just out of necessity and a lack of better options.
This is leadership’s wake-up call. If you don’t offer secure, compliant AI alternatives, your people will keep turning to the open web. And when they do, the responsibility—legally and ethically—rests with you.
So what should leaders do now?
1. Face the facts. Assume AI is already being used unofficially. Build policy around that reality.
2. Get proactive. Provide safe, approved tools for employees to use without fear or friction.
3. Educate with urgency. Communicate what’s allowed, what’s not, and why it matters.
4. Build a governance model. Treat AI like any other business-critical technology—with oversight, accountability, and controls.
5. Think locally. Sovereign AI isn’t a trend. It’s an imperative. Control where your data lives.
AI isn’t just a question of productivity. It’s a question of trust, legality, and long-term viability.
If you’re not leading the conversation inside your company, someone else already is.
And they’re probably doing it in a chat window you can’t see.
Advania helps companies bring AI into the organisation the right way—securely, strategically, and with full control over data, infrastructure, and compliance.
Because “just trying something out” should never cost you a lawsuit.