‘What companies are facing today is an AI zoo’ — NordLayer warns that dozens of unsanctioned chatbots are quietly widening every company’s exposure to data leaks
- AI Scout tracks which artificial intelligence services employees actually use at work
- Employees are increasingly turning to AI services outside approved channels
- NordLayer AI Scout can warn, redact, or block sensitive prompts before submission
Employees are increasingly using AI tools at work, including services their employers may not have approved or formally provided.
That creates uncertainty about which AI platforms workers access, what information they submit, and how those systems connect with business operations.
NordLayer says its new AI Scout tool will now help give organizations visibility into workplace AI activity and the security risks associated with it.
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Seeing actual AI use inside companies
The standalone product monitors browser and desktop interactions while providing controls intended to limit exposure of confidential information across systems.
AI Scout can identify authorized and unauthorized AI services, allowing organizations to compare observed activity against software approved for workplace use.
Its reporting measures usage from real activity rather than purchased subscriptions, and it also estimates token consumption across deployed LLMs.
It also examines information employees send to AI systems, using controls designed to detect potentially sensitive material before certain prompts are submitted.
The company says these safeguards operate before submission, potentially preventing confidential material from reaching an external AI service.
NordLayer also says browser-based controls can intervene when employees enter information requiring additional scrutiny before transmission.
The monitoring extends beyond conventional chatbot use into AI agents and their technical relationships with connected services used at work.
Administrators can inspect MCP infrastructure linked to programming agents and review the capabilities available through those systems in practice.
“We built NordLayer AI Scout for how AI actually works — not just what it looks like from the outside, but for what’s happening at a technical level,” says Vakaris Noreika, VP of product research and development at NordLayer.
“Its AI DLP is designed to inspect prompts and control them pre-submission, to ensure that sensitive data is never inputted in the first place.
Why workplace AI needs closer oversight
The need for monitoring comes as business investment in artificial intelligence grows alongside employee use of unapproved services, a practice known as shadow AI.
Writer’s 2026 enterprise survey found that 59% of companies spend more than $1 million annually on artificial intelligence technology.
A University of Melbourne report cited by NordLayer found that 42% of employees use approved AI systems, while 70% use free models at work.
IBM reports that breaches involving shadow AI add $400,000 to the global average breach cost of $4.99 million worldwide.
Those figures help explain why organizations may struggle to maintain visibility when employees use AI services beyond formally approved platforms.
“What companies are facing today is an AI zoo — dozens of unsanctioned LLMs in daily use across the workforce, each one widening the organization’s exposure to data leaks and security breaches,” says Andrius Buinovskis, VP of product strategy at NordLayer.
“True AI governance requires extensive visibility. With new LLM solutions emerging at a rapid pace, reviewing every new AI tool manually simply doesn’t scale — organizations need telemetry that brings all AI use, sanctioned or not, into one platform.”
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AI Scout tracks which artificial intelligence services employees actually use at work Employees are increasingly turning to AI services outside approved channels NordLayer AI Scout can warn, redact, or block sensitive prompts before submission Employees are increasingly using AI tools at work, including services their employers may not have approved…
