• 40.3% of organizations say their next security dollar will go to AI security and governance, yet 43% learn an AI tool has access to their systems only after the fact, or never
• 54.0% of organizations use AI governance or monitoring controls, yet 46.1% still had an employee connect an unapproved AI tool to corporate systems

WASHINGTON: DNSFilter, the DNS-first security company, powered by AI, today released The Cost of Shadow AI, part of its 2026 Visibility Deficit cybersecurity survey series, revealing that while organizations are moving new security budget into AI governance, many cannot see the AI tools connecting to their systems. One in five (20.1%) say an unapproved AI connection has already led to a security incident. The study found that this visibility gap runs through how AI tools are approved, whether existing controls are working, and what is actually running on corporate networks.

Budgets are growing, and AI governance is first in line for the next dollar. Nearly three-quarters of respondents (74.5%) report a larger cybersecurity budget than 12 months ago, and 18.8% grew theirs by more than 10%. When asked where the next incremental security dollar will go, 40.3% named AI security and governance, nearly 15 points ahead of cloud security at 25.5%. However, access is where oversight falls short. When a new AI tool requests OAuth or API access to corporate systems, 36.8% of organizations let employees grant it and notify IT after the fact, and another 6.5% send no notification at all. That leaves IT teams at 43% of organizations finding out about AI access after it has already been granted, or not at all.

The controls already in place are not closing this gap either. While 54.0% use AI governance or monitoring controls to identify incidents involving third-party AI tools, 46.1% have still had an employee connect an unapproved AI tool to Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, or their SSO environment, and 20.1% say one of those connections caused a security incident.

"Organizations are spending to govern AI, but you can’t govern what you can’t see. On a normal business day, roughly one in seven organizations on our network connects to more than 10 AI tools, yet fewer than one in 100 IT leaders believe that’s happening in their environment. In too many companies, the decision to connect an AI tool to corporate data is being made by someone who doesn’t own the risk. Closing that gap has to be the focus of the next round of spending," said Ken Carnesi, CEO, DNSFilter.

Concern about hidden costs is also uneven across roles. While 54% of respondents are concerned their organization is incurring material AI costs that are invisible to procurement, software asset management, and security monitoring, that figure falls to 43.5% among executive leaders, the lowest of any role group, compared with 58.8% of IT management. The executives who sign off on security budgets are the least concerned about the AI spending they cannot see.

DNSFilter’s own data shows how wide the visibility gap is in practice. In August 2026 alone, DNSFilter processed 3.4 billion requests to generative AI tools from more than 43,000 organizations across North America. On a standard business day, the typical organization saw connections to five distinct AI tools, and 15.2% connected to more than 10. By contrast, only 0.5% of surveyed IT professionals say their employees use more than 10 AI tools, and 55.3% estimate three to five.

"Unfortunately, what organizations self-report and what we see on those networks are often two very different numbers," said Kasey Best, Vice President of Threat Research, DNSFilter. "Allowing AI is a legitimate policy choice, but making no choice at all is not. Every AI tool with web access is reaching out to domains for one reason or another, which means it’s touching DNS, and that’s where we can help. DNSFilter gives security teams a place to start answering three important questions: what’s running, who approved it, and what happens the next time a tool asks for access to sensitive corporate systems."

Additional key findings from the report include:

• 61.5% of respondents cannot say that all of their security tools are properly configured, and 61.8% cannot say all are actively monitored
• More than one in five respondents say half or fewer of their security tools are configured correctly
• 42.8% of organizations using DNSFilter connected to more than five distinct AI tools in a standard business-day window

The DNSFilter AI Cybersecurity Survey 2026 was conducted among 400 IT and cybersecurity professionals at the manager level and above, at companies with 150 to 5,000 employees, across North America, in June 2026. Read the full report and findings here.

More than 57,000 customers worldwide rely on DNSFilter, from global enterprises and mid-market companies to educational institutions, government agencies, MSPs and MSSPs. DNSFilter reaches them directly and through a global partner ecosystem that includes CrowdStrike, Amazon, GuidePoint Security, Climb, SHI, Pax8, N-able and Midis Group.

About DNSFilter

DNSFilter, the DNS-first security company, powered by AI, protects every user at the first click, preventing threats before a connection is ever made, securing organizations and their people wherever they work, live and travel.

DNSFilter stops cyber criminals, rogue states and other malicious actors from hacking your world by delivering best-in-class DNS filtering; behavior analytics; AI governance and controls; encryption and privacy and threat intelligence services that are built upon its proprietary DNS-first platform and intelligence engine.

Its LUMINATE by DNSFilter™ platform is trusted by more than 57,000 organizations around the world, helping to protect thousands of global enterprises, mid-market companies, educational institutions, agencies and MSPs that operate across government, transportation, retail, hospitality, healthcare and many more verticals. 100 million+ users worldwide rely on DNSFilter to keep them safe every day. Deployed in minutes, it protects users at the first source of contact. Learn more at dnsfilter.com.

Fonte: Business Wire