Shadow Agents Raise Security and Enterprise Data Concerns

AvePoint's John Hodges on Why IT and Business Must Partner to Secure Enterprise AI Michael Novinson (MichaelNovinson) • November 27, 2025

Business units within enterprises moved fast on deploying agentic artificial intelligence to build tools that addressed immediate workflow problems, creating a wave of uncontrolled growth.

The early growth of agentic AI mirrors past technology waves when business units drove adoption before central oversight existed. "We used to call it shadow IT. Now it is 'shadow agents' that are being created, and we don't see that slowing down anytime soon," said John Hodges, chief product officer at AvePoint.

"They don't know what type of data they're grounding on, what types of information are being responded to, even what use cases are serving the business and which ones are high priority that they should focus on and bring into that IT fold of protection," Hodges said.

IT and ...