Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning
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Data Privacy
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Data Security
Cisco Research Shows How AI Is Reshaping Data Privacy and Governance
Enterprise data privacy and governance are undergoing fundamental shifts as the promised speed and efficiency of artificial intelligence come crashing into the realities of data risk and regulatory uncertainty.
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The Cisco 2026 Data and Privacy Benchmark Study shows how enterprises are weathering this transformation, highlighting ways privacy has moved from a compliance exercise to a cornerstone of enterprise strategy. AI is the primary driver of this evolution, with 90% of companies saying it’s driving the expansion of their privacy programs. According to the survey report, 93% plan to invest more to keep pace with the growth of AI and the expectations of both regulators and customers.
And it’s growing more costly. This year, 38% of respondents said they spent at least $5 million on privacy programs in 2025, up from 14% in 2024.
For CIOs, the mandate is clear, but not simple. They must create mature privacy programs at the intersection of AI, privacy and governance as they simultaneously work to enable innovation and maintain the integrity of corporate data.
“As things have evolved, things go far beyond privacy now,” said Harvey Jang, chief privacy officer, Cisco. “It’s all converging together.”
The study, based on a survey of over 5,200 IT and security professionals in 12 regions, says nearly all organizations (99%) now see measurable return on privacy investments with boosts to agility, innovation and customer retention. While 96% report that having a robust privacy framework enables AI agility and innovation, 95% recognize that privacy is key to maintaining customer trust.
Enabling these results is a matter of managing complexity by going back to the basics of data management, Jang said. “Before you can be transparent about your data, you have to understand it – what you’re doing, where you’re keeping it, why and how it’s protected.”
At the same time 90% of respondents say AI has expanded the scope of their privacy programs, and CIOs are the gatekeepers of everything from HR to proprietary to operational data. Every dataset, model and system must operate within ethical and regulatory boundaries.
Organizations are struggling with this gap in governance. While three in four organizations have established dedicated AI governance committees, only 12% are considered “mature.”
“I think the definition of maturity may actually need to mature,” Jang said. “With AI, there’s so much that’s unknown. A mature program isn’t just about preventing mistakes, it’s about being able to deal with incidents when they arise, pivot and remediate quickly.”
CIOs face several operational hurdles, however, when it comes to maintaining data discipline and AI exposes several long-standing problems many organizations have with data hygiene.
“A lot of the data is not usable. The data hygiene is a mess,” Jang said. “Some studies show that up to 80% of the data we collect isn’t usable. It’s hypersensitive, not prepared, or not clean enough.”
The survey finds that 65% of organizations struggle to access relevant, high-quality data efficiently and 77% say the protection of IP is a concern. When it comes to tagging and classification, 66% say they have formal gateway systems, but only 51% say those systems are comprehensive or automated.
While governance and data hygiene are important, the endgame is maintaining customer trust, and transparency about how data is collected and used is the biggest driver of that trust, the survey finds. 46% of respondents said that transparency and clear communication are the foundation of customer confidence.
Honesty gets higher marks than perfection. Maintaining compliance mattered to 18% and data breach prevention to just 14%.
For CIOs, the mandate is clear. AI innovation will be born from transparency and having a strong data foundation with strong privacy programs in place.
“If you anchor on trust – transparency, fairness and accountability – you enable a lot more innovation,” Jang said. “Enterprise data is the untapped frontier, and CIOs are the gatekeepers to that data.”