Spy chiefs launch AI company to protect corporate secrets

A group of former British spy chiefs have launched a company designed to protect corporate secrets from being read by artificial intelligence.

Sir Jeremy Fleming, who has experience running the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), is helping to set up a company called AI Score that aims to prevent sensitive data leaking to tech companies.

There are fears that chatbots such as ChatGPT could ingest and potentially repeat private company data when used in the workplace. AI Score provides software companies with the ability to install on their corporate networks to monitor employees using AI tools.

AI Score said it was already working with a large law firm, a consumer company, and a fintech business.

The startup has secured funding from Gallos, an investment firm run by former intelligence staff and advised by Sir Jeremy.

It will be run by Alex Harland, who was part of the founding team of the National Cyber Security Centre, GCHQ’s cyber defence arm. Sir Jeremy and Josh Burch, Gallos’s founder, will sit on the company’s advisory board.

Gallos was set up in 2021 by Mr Burch, a former high-ranking national intelligence official, and Dean Jones, an armed forces veteran.

Its advisors include Sir Jeremy, who left GCHQ in 2023, Gaven Smith, the agency’s former technology chief, and Tom Hurd, the former homeland security advisor.

AI Score has raised more than $1m in funding from angel investors and Gallos.

MR Burch said: “We’ve seen, through our experience in intelligence and business, the dangers as well as the opportunities inherent in how organisations use AI. Large parts of the corporate world haven’t yet absorbed the risks they’re running.”

Gallos said that four-fifths of corporate security bosses felt unable to keep tabs on how AI is being used across their workplaces.

AI Score’s system can monitor what employees enter into chatbots, checking for trigger words and phrases that might suggest they are entering sensitive information, as well as which tools they are using.

Companies, including Samsung and Amazon, have warned staff about the use of AI tools after suspected cases of chatbots regurgitating confidential information entered into them by employees.

The Cabinet Office tells civil servants to “never input information that is classified, sensitive or reveals the intent of Government” into the bots.

AI Score is the second to be incubated by Gallos, which claims to benefit from deep connections at the highest levels of Government.

The group says it “enjoys privileged access to unique deal flow and highly expert human capital thanks to our deep connectivity within the security establishment networks in the UK and US, especially”.