AI visibility gap: 85% vs 25%
New Optro Research finds 85% of enterprises have deployed AI but only 25% have full visibility into their AI footprint—an oversight gap that raises auditability and trust issues. For finance teams, that means AI‑driven outputs may be hard to explain in executive reports unless model lineage and impact are documented. (prnewswire.com)
Optro’s 2026 Risk Intelligence Report, titled “The AI Oversight Gap,” was published March 17, 2026 and is based on a survey of more than 800 global GRC and IT decision-makers. (prnewswire.com (prnewswire.com)) The report labels “shadow AI” as moderate-to-pervasive in roughly 80% of organizations and records that 82% of respondents reported an increase in AI-enabled attacks over the past year. (prnewswire.com (prnewswire.com)) Respondents also reported specific AI-related incidents in the prior 12 months: 40% experienced inaccurate AI outputs, 27% reported data breaches tied to AI, and 26% faced regulatory actions connected to AI use. (prnewswire.com (prnewswire.com)) Only 34% of organizations say their AI governance program is strategic and continuously improving, according to Optro’s product announcement the same day. (prnewswire.com (prnewswire.com)) Optro’s accompanying research asset finds 48% of organizations report using AI “extensively,” while a September 2024 flash poll of 1,335 security, compliance, and risk professionals shows high-maturity teams are about 6x more likely than peers to apply AI across multiple GRC functions. (resources.optro.ai (resources.optro.ai)) The same PDF shows 72% of high-maturity organizations use AI to track risk versus 52% of low-maturity organizations. (resources.optro.ai (resources.optro.ai)) The March 17 product release followed Optro’s corporate name change from AuditBoard the week prior and introduced unified AI-governance, cyber-risk, and continuous control-monitoring capabilities intended to make AI risks visible and enforceable across the enterprise. (prnewswire.com (prnewswire.com)) Optro’s GM of AI Governance, Guru Sethupathy, said embedding monitoring and oversight into the AI lifecycle lets organizations “move faster and more securely,” framing governance as a means to shorten time‑to‑value. (prnewswire.com (prnewswire.com)) The report’s central prescription is operational: closing the visibility gap is framed as the first step to convert “hidden” or unsanctioned AI into a governed corporate asset that supports predictable controls and clearer model lineage. (prnewswire.com (prnewswire.com))
