Source URL: https://simonwillison.net/2024/Aug/23/microsoft-copilot-data-governance/#atom-everything
Source: Simon Willison’s Weblog
Title: Top companies ground Microsoft Copilot over data governance concerns
Feedly Summary: Top companies ground Microsoft Copilot over data governance concerns
Microsoft’s use of the term “Copilot” is pretty confusing these days – this article appears to be about Microsoft 365 Copilot, which is effectively an internal RAG chatbot with access to your company’s private data from tools like SharePoint.
The concern here isn’t the usual fear of data leaked to the model or prompt injection security concerns. It’s something much more banal: it turns out many companies don’t have the right privacy controls in place to safely enable these tools. Jack Berkowitz:
Particularly around bigger companies that have complex permissions around their SharePoint or their Office 365 or things like that, where the Copilots are basically aggressively summarizing information that maybe people technically have access to but shouldn’t have access to.
Now, maybe if you set up a totally clean Microsoft environment from day one, that would be alleviated. But nobody has that.
If your document permissions aren’t properly locked down, anyone in the company who asks the chatbot “how much does everyone get paid here?” might get an instant answer!
This is a fun example of a problem with AI systems caused by them working exactly as advertised.
This is also not a new problem: the article mentions similar concerns introduced when companies tried adopting Google Search Appliance for internal search more than twenty years ago.
Via Hacker News
Tags: llms, security, ethics, generative-ai, ai, microsoft, rag
AI Summary and Description: Yes
Summary: The article discusses the potential data governance issues associated with Microsoft 365 Copilot, particularly focusing on privacy controls within organizations. It highlights the risks of allowing AI tools to access sensitive company information without adequate permissions, emphasizing the need for proper data governance and security measures.
Detailed Description: The discussion centers around the implications of using AI-driven tools like Microsoft 365 Copilot in larger corporate environments, where the complexity of data permissions can lead to unauthorized access to confidential information. Key points include:
– **Data Governance Concerns**: Many organizations struggle with proper data governance, which is critical when integrating AI tools that can summarize or access sensitive information.
– **Access Control Issues**: The article highlights that existing document permissions may not be sufficiently stringent, allowing employees to inadvertently access or inquire about sensitive data, such as salary information, which poses a significant privacy risk.
– **Historical Context**: The mention of similar issues faced with Google Search Appliance indicates that the challenges of AI in the workplace are not new. Companies have historically struggled with information retrieval tools accessing confidential data without appropriate safeguards.
– **Recommendations for Organizations**:
– Conduct regular audits of data permissions to ensure sensitive information is appropriately protected.
– Adopt a Zero Trust approach to data access, where every request for information is treated as though it originates from an open network.
– Implement comprehensive data governance frameworks that clarify who has access to what information and under what circumstances.
In conclusion, this article serves as a warning for organizations leveraging AI tools to ensure they have robust data governance and security measures to prevent inadvertent data breaches that could arise from AI’s operational capabilities. It underlines the necessity of privacy compliance and vigilance in a rapidly evolving technological landscape.