What Every Business Should Know About Their Data
Businesses are embracing AI at an incredible pace, but many are making decisions before fully understanding the implications for their data. While tools like Microsoft 365 Copilot and ChatGPT can both deliver significant productivity gains, they don’t handle business data in the same way. Understanding that difference is crucial if you want to benefit from AI without creating unnecessary security, compliance or governance risks.
From drafting emails and summarising meetings to searching company documents, AI is quickly becoming part of daily work. Most businesses we talk to are already using it in some form, whether that’s through an approved solution or someone on the team quietly pasting information into ChatGPT.
Here’s the bit that often gets missed: not every AI tool treats your data the same way.
The core difference
Microsoft 365 Copilot lives inside the Microsoft 365 environment you already have. It only sees what a user could already see, with the same permissions, the same Purview DLP policies and the same Conditional Access rules. Nothing new to configure. Nothing new to trust.
ChatGPT connectors work differently. Once connected, your Microsoft 365 data can be processed outside that boundary, and permission changes don’t always sync across instantly. That’s not a dealbreaker. Plenty of businesses use ChatGPT well. However, it does mean you’re extending trust to a new system, and that deserves the same scrutiny you’d give any new supplier.
One important caveat applies whichever way you lean: not all AI tools are created equal, and it matters which ones you let near company data, whether that’s Copilot, ChatGPT connectors, or whatever free tool turned up in your feed this morning. Before adopting any of them, it’s worth asking: Who’s behind it? Where does your data actually go, and is it used to train their models? Does it still meet UK GDPR requirements once it’s there? Would you be comfortable explaining its use to a customer or a regulator? Treat it with the same due diligence you’d apply to any new supplier, because that’s exactly what it is. If in doubt, ask us before you connect it, not after.
Getting ahead of it
The businesses that get this right aren’t necessarily the fastest to adopt AI. They’re the ones with a bit of structure around it before problems show up:
- A short, plain-English policy on which tools are approved and what shouldn’t be pasted into any of them
- A quick look at who actually has access to what in SharePoint and Teams. AI has a habit of surfacing permission issues that had quietly gone unnoticed for years
- Spend a few minutes training staff so people know what’s fine to share and what isn’t
None of this is about slowing AI down. It’s about making sure you can say yes to it with confidence, rather than finding out the hard way what you’d connected to what.
The bottom line
Copilot and ChatGPT can both be genuinely useful, but they’re not interchangeable when it comes to where your data ends up. If you’re weighing up which makes sense for your business, or want a second opinion before you connect either to company data, get in touch. We’re happy to talk it through.
