AI vendor dependency is becoming a resilience risk

Now that AI has quickly become embedded in global enterprise operations, it has the ability to impact everything from data analysis to decision-making and even security.

Most conversations, however, focus on AI capability, power, productivity, and accuracy, but leave out one major issue.

While everyone is focused on what happens as AI is implemented, very few are asking what happens when access to AI capability suddenly disappears.

A prominent example of this is the debate around Anthropic restoring access to its Fable and Mythos AI models, which primarily revolved around compliance timelines and export control mechanics.

Yet, few have questioned why so many organizations discovered that one external decision, out of their control, removed a business-critical capability seemingly overnight.

In short, AI access disruptions are a symptom of a much larger operational resilience issue, and expose an overlooked governance gap around dependency.

As organizations integrate AI deeper into their business operations, they need to shift their focus from exploring whether AI is secure enough right now to start asking whether their organizations can even continue operating if or when those very AI services become unavailable.

Security does not equal resilience These little discussed topics bring up an important point that security and resilience are not synonymous.

Security prevents and protects systems from compromise.

This keeps attackers from gaining access, reduces the number of vulnerabilities, and defends against malicious entities - all crucial elements of security operations.

Resilience is the ability to continue business operations when systems, services, or data become unavailable, regardless of the cause.

We tend to associate resilience with situations such as cyberattacks or IT infrastructure failures.

AI has changed the threat landscape for organizations, how they work with AI, and protect themselves from it.

Organizations must now increasingly plan for disrupted access to critical tools and functions caused by geopolitical decisions, regulations, or changes made by technology providers themselves.