Pittsburgh TechFest 2026

Artificial intelligence is rapidly becoming the most productive, and potentially overprivileged, member of your workforce. Employees are feeding sensitive information into AI tools, organizations are connecting coworkers to corporate data, and autonomous agents are gaining the ability to read, write, execute, and make decisions. Meanwhile, attackers are using the same technology to accelerate phishing, vulnerability discovery, impersonation, and social engineering.


The numbers suggest this is no longer theoretical. Employee use of unapproved “shadow AI” had tripled to 45%, while vulnerability exploitation became the leading breach entry point at 31%. At the same time, OWASP now identifies prompt injection, sensitive-information disclosure, supply-chain risk, and excessive agency among the major security risks facing generative AI systems.


In this energetic, practical session, we will separate AI hype from AI risk and fearmongering and discuss how to embrace AI without accidentally giving it the keys to the kingdom.