Closing the AI control gap: Why channel partners are now on the front line

In recent years, for many MSPs and MSSPs, AI has moved quickly from a future conversation to a current customer problem. Indeed, our own research found that 72% of organizations believe they have full visibility into AI usage, yet 65% are still uncovering shadow or unauthorised AI activity.

Most businesses, particularly those that operate in highly regulated sectors, acknowledge the risks of AI, but are unaware of how to control it. As a result, many organizations are now turning to partners to help them bridge the gap between perceived confidence and reality.

While this challenge presents a significant commercial opportunity for channel partners, it also highlights the importance of understanding the risks of shadow AI and uncontrolled usage and how they can effectively advise customers to harness this emerging opportunity.

Understanding the AI control gap for businesses

The core challenge organizations currently face is a misunderstanding of how AI is actually being used within the business. The popularity of generative AI tools such as large language models (LLMs) has skyrocketed, as organizations look to boost productivity, with a reported 92% of Fortune 100 companies now using ChatGPT in some capacity. Yet the risk lies in how these tools are being used by employees, which is often without formal oversight and with limited awareness of the potential risks involved.

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While the instinct for business leaders to ban AI use entirely is understandable, it's completely counterproductive. Employees who have already benefited from these tools will not simply stop using them; they will inevitably find workarounds, often on personal devices with no organizational visibility whatsoever. A blanket ban does not reduce risk; it simply relocates it beyond reach. Here, the role of channel partners, particularly MSPs and MSSPs, becomes not just relevant but essential.

Organizations need guidance from advisors they already trust, and the skills required to close the AI control gap sit squarely within the channel's wheelhouse. Therefore, partners need to leverage technical and strategic skills in this area to help customers tackle this issue.

Why AI governance Is the channel's next big opportunity

For many channel partners, the starting point is shifting how customers think about AI risk and visibility. Having a policy in place is not the same as having control, yet, according to our research, more than 60% of organizations already believe they have adequate frameworks and oversight. In most cases, that confidence is misplaced, because policy without genuine visibility is not governance but assumption dressed up as oversight.

The reality is that AI usage is fragmented, spreading across teams, devices, and applications in ways that make a complete picture almost impossible to build through traditional means.

Sanctioned tools sit alongside unsanctioned ones, and employee behaviour routinely outpaces the policies designed to govern it. Helping customers see that gap clearly and understand what it actually exposes them to is where channel partners can add immediate value.

The customer demand to support that guidance is already well established, with many organizations actively seeking answers to questions around which tools are safe to use, how sensitive data should be handled, and how employees can work with AI effectively. As a result, the demand for advisory engagements around AI governance, risk assessments, and policy development growing in value, as well as continuous monitoring and behavioural analysis to detect risky usage in real time, is growing in value.

This presents a significant commercial opportunity for the channel by unlocking the potential for new services and revenue streams. Another advantage is that AI usage control is not a project with a defined end date, but rather an ongoing service discipline that plays directly to the strengths of MSPs and MSSPs built for managed, long-term customer relationships.

What effective AI usage control looks like

The key to providing effective support to organizations is looking beyond technical solutions alone and striking the right balance between security and visibility to effectively govern AI usage. This is particularly important given that overly restrictive policies can actively undermine those efforts, consequently pushing employees toward shadow tools and increasing the high risks organizations are trying to reduce.

The main focus should be directed towards educating organizations to help them understand how AI is being used across the business, identifying high-risk behaviours, and guiding employees in real time. Channel partners play a critical role in assisting organizations with embedding safe AI usage into everyday workflows and becoming a natural part of how they operate.

In the long run, the AI control gap is not a failure of technology but a reflection of how quickly adoption has outpaced governance. While businesses are right to prioritise the benefits of AI, it is equally important that they do so within a framework of guardrails that ensure it is used safely.

As that gap continues to widen, channel partners who combine technical depth with strategic insight will be best placed to lead, helping customers move from guesswork to control, and turning AI from an unmanaged risk into a managed advantage.