What is Barracuda AI Security?
Barracuda AI Security helps organizations discover, assess and govern AI usage across their environment. It makes shadow AI visible, adds risk and compliance context and applies practical guidelines—all within the BarracudaONE platform or with Barracuda SecureEdge Access to deliver the network-level visibility and central control needed to identify and manage AI usage.
Half of employees turn to shadow AI, keeping out of sight of IT.
AI adoption is already happening inside your business, often without IT approval or clear guardrails. Barracuda AI Security helps you uncover shadow AI, understand which tools create data and compliance risk and then apply practical controls that work in real‑world businesses and managed service provider (MSP) environments.
Why is shadow AI a security risk?
The problem: AI is accelerating faster than governance
AI tools are embedded in everyday applications and are freely available online. Employees adopt them to work faster, but often without understanding how data is handled, stored or reused. For IT and security teams, this creates blind spots that traditional controls weren’t designed to handle.
Why this matters now
Without visibility and clear guidelines, businesses risk data leakage, compliance failures and breaches driven by shadow AI and unmanaged AI usage.
Key stats: Shadow AI is already a security issue
50%
of employees use unauthorized AI tools at work.
57%
of employees hide AI usage from their supervisors
66%
of employees use AI without knowing if it’s permitted.
48%
of employees have input confidential data into public AI services.
32%
of unauthorized data exposure incidents are traced to generative AI tools, making it the top data exfiltration method.
1 in 5
organizations report a breach caused by unsanctioned AI usage.
The Bottom Line: AI risk isn’t theoretical; it’s already impacting many businesses.
How does shadow AI create risk in real environments?
How it happens: The anatomy of AI usage risk
Shadow AI doesn’t appear overnight. It follows a predictable pattern:
Shadow AI adoption
Employees start using unapproved AI tools or embedded AI features to speed up daily work.
Data exposure
Sensitive data is pasted into prompts or uploaded to external AI services, often without awareness of retention or reuse.
Policy and compliance gaps
With no visibility or benchmarks for acceptable AI risk, businesses struggle to enforce policies or explain risk to auditors and leadership.
Incident or audit fallout
Data leakage, regulatory exposure or breaches occur, without clear records of where AI was used or what data was involved.
Barracuda helps at every stage, before AI usage becomes a breach or audit issue.
How can teams discover and govern AI usage?
Solution overview:
Protect AI usage at every stage
Barracuda AI Security is a capability delivered either through BarracudaONE or Barracuda SecureEdge Access—with both designed to help businesses and MSPs move from uncertainty to control, without deploying complex, standalone AI security tools.
BarracudaONE is the perfect fit for organizations already using third‑party DNS‑based security tools to manage web access. In this scenario, customers can ingest AI usage data into BarracudaONE from an external control, such as Cisco Umbrella DNS.
For customers looking to replace their DNS security solution with a more streamlined and operationally efficient approach, Barracuda SecureEdge Access delivers an integrated, end‑to‑end, AI security experience.
Barracuda AI Security brings together three practical pillars:
Discover shadow AI usage
Assess risk and compliance context
Govern usage with simple, effective guidelines
All within the same Barracuda platform you already trust.
Discover shadow AI usage
You can’t govern what you don’t see
The challenge
AI usage is decentralized and often invisible to IT. Employees adopt unapproved AI tools or embedded AI features without understanding how data is handled, leaving organizations blind to where AI risk exists.
Key capabilities
- Automatic discovery of AI tools in use across the organization
- Visibility into unsanctioned or unknown AI services
- Discovery powered by existing network and domain name system (DNS) telemetry — no agents or complex deployments
Outcome
A clear, accurate view of which AI tools are being used, so AI risk and AI usage visibility can be addressed based on facts, not assumptions.
Built for Managed Service Providers and SMB reality
Designed to scale without adding operational burden
The challenge
SMBs and MSPs face limited resources, growing customer expectations and increasing pressure to provide AI guidance, often without the tools or frameworks to do so efficiently.
Key capabilities
- Centralized dashboards with multi‑tenant visibility
- Guided onboarding and low‑touch operation
- Consistent AI risk insights that support repeatable assessments and advisory services
Outcome
AI security that fits real‑world operations, enabling SMB IT teams to govern AI confidently and MSPs to turn AI risk into a scalable, value‑added service.
Assess AI risk and compliance context
Not all AI tools pose the same risk
The challenge
Most businesses lack benchmarks for acceptable AI usage. Without context, IT teams struggle to decide which AI tools are safe, which require oversight and which should be restricted.
Key capabilities
- AI Risk Classification applied to each discovered AI service
- Clear context around data exposure, privacy and compliance risk
- Prioritization of higher‑risk AI tools with understandable rationale
Outcome
Actionable insight into which AI services pose the greatest risk as part of an overall AI risk assessment, enabling faster, more confident decisions without requiring deep AI or regulatory expertise.
Govern AI usage with practical guidelines
Establish control without driving AI underground
The challenge
Outright bans and complex policy engines don’t work. Employees continue using AI tools in the shadows, increasing data and compliance risk while reducing trust between users and IT.
Key capabilities
- Simple approve, deny or redirect workflows for AI usage
- Governance controls integrated
- Ability to guide users toward approved, lower‑risk AI services
Outcome
Reduced AI‑related data and compliance exposure while keeping AI usage visible, manageable and aligned with business needs.
Built for Managed Service Providers and SMB reality
Designed to scale without adding operational burden
The challenge
SMBs and MSPs face limited resources, growing customer expectations and increasing pressure to provide AI guidance, often without the tools or frameworks to do so efficiently.
Key capabilities
- Centralized dashboards with multi‑tenant visibility
- Guided onboarding and low‑touch operation
- Consistent AI risk insights that support repeatable assessments and advisory services
Outcome
Reduced AI‑related data and compliance exposure while keeping AI usage visible, manageable and aligned with business needs.
Why Barracuda AI security is different
Native to the BarracudaONE platform
AI Security is delivered as a built‑in capability, not a standalone product, reducing cost, friction and operational overhead.
Available out-of-the-box
Even with the most affordable Barracuda SecureEdge Access plan (i.e., DNS Access)
SecureEdge Access help businesses move from AI risk insight to enforcement in just a few clicks— without deploying complex infrastructure or managing multiple tools. This makes SecureEdge the simplest path from discovery to control.
Helps define acceptable AI risk
In an immature security category, Barracuda provides structure, classification and guidance where standards are still emerging, positioning Barracuda as a trusted advisor, not just a tool.
Practical governance for today’s teams
Approve, deny or redirect workflows help teams focus on what SMBs and MSPs can realistically implement today, without specialist expertise or heavy policy engines.
Frequently asked questions
Shadow AI refers to AI tools or features that employees use without formal approval or oversight from IT or security teams. These tools can introduce data, compliance and security risk when usage is invisible or unmanaged.
AI tools are often embedded in everyday apps or available online, making them easy to adopt without review. Traditional security controls were not designed to track or assess AI usage in this way.
Barracuda AI Security automatically identifies AI tools and services in use across the environment using existing network and domain name system (DNS) telemetry, without agents or complex deployments.
It is designed for small and midsize businesses (SMBs) and managed service providers (MSPs) that need practical AI governance without adding operational complexity.
Outcomes customers and partners achieve
Identify unsanctioned AI usage in days, not months
Reduce compliance exposure by guiding usage to approved tools
Deliver AI risk assessments as a repeatable MSP service
Move from reactive incidents to proactive AI governance
At last, have a place to enforce AI-focused security and usage policies
Supporting reality
13%
of organizations have already experienced an AI‑related breach.
97%
of organizations lack proper AI access controls.
Resources
AI Security Solution Brief
