Artificial intelligence is changing the way businesses work and the way they deal with risk. Most executives believe AI can provide an edge over their competitors, prompting a rush to use it without fully understanding the risks. This often means lacking the governance frameworks needed to manage those risks and ensure AI is being appropriately and responsibly utilized.
The NAVEX 2025 State of Risk & Compliance Report shows a clear trend: only 65% of compliance leaders are involved in the process for determining how and when AI should be used. This leads to strategic issues about implementing strong AI governance or thinking about the consequences of usage.
WHERE COMPLIANCE STANDS TODAY
AI governance usually starts in IT and ends up staying there. Almost 40% of companies put their IT teams in charge of establishing AI policies, and then Legal, Risk, and Compliance give advice after the fact. That fragmentation makes it hard to see things like who owns the data, algorithmic bias, and how prepared the rules are.
AI risk management becomes reactive when there is no shared ownership. To make sure that every deployment follows ethical and legal rules, compliance executives need to get involved early on, from designing the model and getting the data to monitoring and responding to incidents.
THE RISKS BENEATH THE CODE
AI promises efficiency and insight but, at the same time, it introduces new exposures:
- Data loss and leakage when training is modeled on sensitive or ungoverned data.
- Intellectual property misuse from unlicensed or proprietary content.
- Bias and discrimination embedded in algorithms that lack diverse oversight.
The NAVEX data shows 60 percent of organizations worry most about data flow issues, yet few are addressing fairness, transparency, or bias — three areas that are emerging as regulatory flashpoints under frameworks like the EU AI Act and ISO 42001.
VISIBILITY IS THE MISSING LINK
Two-thirds of compliance experts said that not being able to see AI dangers or holes in control implementation is their biggest worry. These aren’t just difficulties with technology; they are governance issues.
Adding AI oversight to current compliance systems with uniform reporting, clear ownership, and ongoing monitoring lets leaders identify where models are being deployed, how well they are working, and whether they follow the company’s rules and ethical standards.
FROM RISK TO READINESS
The leaders who will thrive in the next wave of AI adoption are those who treat compliance as an enabler, not an obstacle. Four foundational actions can accelerate readiness:
- Integrate AI into your existing compliance framework (ISO 42001, NIST AI RMF).
- Clarify accountability across IT, Legal, Risk, and Compliance.
- Automate monitoring and reporting to detect issues in real time.
- Educate ethically by encouraging AI literacy at every level of the organization.
LEAD THE NEXT ERA OF COMPLIANCE
The organizations leading the charge in AI are doing much more than using it. They are governing it responsibly. Explore our new infographic, AI and Compliance: The New Governance Frontier, to see where your peers stand and the steps you can take to strengthen AI oversight and corporate usage now before regulation demands it.
