In today’s fast-evolving digital landscape, organizations are racing to adopt AI tools that accelerate productivity, innovation, and competitive advantage. But this transformation brings a critical new challenge: how do you protect your most sensitive information when it can be uploaded, recombined, or exposed to third-party models overnight? That’s where AI data security becomes mission-critical—ensuring that the power of AI doesn’t become a vector for costly data breaches or compliance failures.
At Cyberhaven, we built our platform from the ground up around this very dilemma. Our approach doesn’t just monitor content, it tracks how data flows, evolves, and interacts across environments—giving you the visibility and control needed to adopt AI safely.
You can explore the full product capabilities here: AI data security.
The Blind Spots in Traditional Data Protection
Traditional data security tools—like classic DLP, content filters, or static classification engines—were designed for a world of files, fixed databases, and well-defined endpoints. But in the era of generative AI:
Data is fragmented, transformed, pasted, summarized, and combined in new ways.
Users may feed proprietary code, designs, or sensitive documents into AI tools (intentionally or by mistake).
Shadow AI usage (i.e. employees using AI tools without oversight) proliferates, crossing departmental and technological boundaries.
These factors create blind spots that old-school tools simply weren’t built to detect or manage.
What AI Data Security Means at Cyberhaven
Cyberhaven’s vision of AI data security combines four core capabilities to protect your data in the age of intelligent systems:
Shadow AI Discovery
Uncover every AI tool in use—whether embedded, sanctioned, or unknown. This includes SaaS apps with built-in AI, standalone tools, and even usage via personal accounts. cyberhaven.com+1
AI Usage Insights
Monitor how AI tools are actually being used—who is using them, what data they’re sending, and how responses are handled. This gives security teams context and visibility into risk. cyberhaven.com+1
AI Risk IQ
Not all AI tools are equal in risk. Cyberhaven assigns risk scores to hundreds of AI products, evaluating data sensitivity, compliance posture, access controls, and more. PR Newswire+1
AI Data Flow Control
When data flows toward or from AI tools, Cyberhaven uses its Data Detection and Response (DDR) engine to apply policy controls—blocking, warning, or routing actions to prevent sensitive data from leaking. cyberhaven.com+1
Together, these features enable organizations to enable AI adoption, while maintaining guardrails and reducing exposure.
The Technology Behind the Protection
To support robust AI data security, Cyberhaven relies heavily on two foundational technologies:
Data Lineage & Event Recording
Every event affecting a piece of data—moves, copies, edits, shares—is recorded to build a comprehensive lineage that shows where data originated, how it propagated, and where it exists. cyberhaven.com+1
Linea AI & the Large Lineage Model (LLiM)
Linea AI is Cyberhaven’s AI agent built on a novel “Large Lineage Model,” which learns from billions of data workflows to detect anomalous or risky behavior—things that rule-based systems would miss. cyberhaven.com+2cyberhaven.com+2
Recently, Cyberhaven enhanced Linea AI with advanced content understanding, including multimodal analysis (text + image) to better distinguish sensitive content from innocuous material. PR Newswire
These technologies allow the system to think contextually about data—not just matching patterns or keywords, but understanding how data moves and when it’s at risk.
Business Risks & The Cost of Inaction
A recent Cyberhaven report covering 7 million workers found that 71.7% of AI tools in use are rated high or critical risk, and 83.8% of enterprise data sent to AI tools went to risky platforms. cyberhaven.com+1
Sensitive data like source code, R&D materials, and marketing strategies are among the most common types of information being sent to AI without visibility. cyberhaven.com+1
Security teams using Cyberhaven’s lineage analytics and AI models report 80% faster response to incidents and reductions in manual review burden. Venturebeat
For any company serious about AI adoption, the question isn’t “if” data will flow to AI—it’s “how well” they control and monitor that flow.
How Organizations Can Get Started Safely
Discover all AI usage
Use tools that identify shadow and sanctioned AI usage across the organization, not just those you already know.
Classify data at use time
Focus not only on what’s stored, but what is actively being sent to AI systems in real time.
Apply risk-based controls
Some AI tools are acceptable for low sensitivity data; others are not. Use tiered policies to decide which data can flow where.
Close the feedback loop
When incidents or risky patterns emerge, feed them back into policies and risk models to continuously strengthen your defenses.
Educate users
Use real-time alerts and messaging—not just blocks—to inform users when they attempt risky behavior, helping them develop safer habits.
Why Cyberhaven Is Uniquely Positioned
While many vendors bolt on AI monitoring modules to legacy platforms, Cyberhaven was designed as an AI-first data security platform from day one. The architecture—built on data lineage, event capture, and Linea AI’s predictive insights—scales to modern, cloud-native environments and evolving AI adoption models. cyberhaven.com+2cyberhaven.com+2
By integrating DLP, insider threat, and AI risk control into one cohesive platform, organizations can reduce tool sprawl, lower false positives, and gain unified visibility across all data surfaces.
Conclusion
AI offers tremendous opportunity—but without careful safeguards, it also opens new paths for data leakage, intellectual property exposure, and compliance violations. The
Cyberhaven’s AI data security solution delivers exactly that: from lineage to risk scoring to enforcement, it equips security teams to adopt AI thoughtfully and confidently. If your organization is ready to move forward in the AI era—without leaving your most critical data exposed—take the next step and explore our offering: AI data security.
