New DNSFilter Research Finds Companies Are Increasingly Blocking Certain GenAI Tools

Amid growing concern over shadow AI, more companies are enforcing policy via DNS filtering

WASHINGTON, May 20, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- DNSFilter announced today that more organizations are blocking traffic to generative AI tools as they try to establish policies around AI usage and reduce the risks of shadow AI. That's according to data from the company's DNS security platform, which is processing more traffic to generative AI tools than ever before.

As organizations juggle productivity and security, they are becoming more mature about which domains they allow employees to use; they are creating internal policies aimed at reducing shadow AI and establishing defined guidelines for generative AI usage. For some organizations, blocking certain domains can be an effective way to set policy, protect the company and deploy more control of what tools are being used.

DNSFilter offers a generative AI category that allows organizations to easily block and filter these domains. In March, the company blocked over 60 million generative AI requests, representing about 12% of all such queries.

In an analysis of recent traffic, DNSFilter's researchers also found:

• Generative AI queries are on the rise: Since January 2024, DNSFilter has been processing a monthly average of over 330 million queries that fall under this category.
• Certain sites are more likely to be blocked by organizations: Notion was the most blocked of all generative AI queries in March, accounting for 93% of all blocked generative AI queries – and far more than the number of blocked queries for Microsoft Copilot, SwishApps, Quillbot and OpenAI combined.
• Bad actors are shifting their use of malicious generative AI domains: There was a 92% decrease in malicious and fake ChatGPT and other generative AI sites between April 2024 and April 2025. However, there was a rise in malicious sites with "openai" in the name, rising 2,000% between April 2024 and April 2025.

With the intention of reducing shadow IT, organizations are likely inclined to block unapproved generative AI tools and only allow ones that make sense for their organization. Otherwise, they run the risk of employees using "open" generative AI tools without IT oversight.

Protective DNS can be used to help block malicious threats, but it can also be used as part of an organization's policy or strategy for employee use of generative AI to help reduce the rise of shadow AI – which can enable a whole host of additional risks because it happens outside the purview of IT and security teams.

Ken Carnesi, CEO and co-founder, DNSFilter, said: "Companies know the benefits that generative AI offers, but they also know the potential cybersecurity risks. More organizations are now proactively choosing which tools to block and which to allow. That way, employees can't 'sneak' AI tools into the corporate network or inadvertently use a malicious one. In this way, a DNS filtering solution helps companies enforce policies, block possible threats and enable greater productivity all at the same time."

About the company:
DNSFilter is making the Internet safer and workplaces more productive by blocking malicious and unwanted content at the DNS layer. DNSFilter resolves upwards of 170 billion daily queries—200 million of those queries are blocked cyber threats. With 79% of attacks using Domain Name System (DNS), DNSFilter provides the world's fastest protective DNS powered by AI, blocking threats an average of 10 days faster than traditional threat feeds. Over 40,000 organizations trust DNSFilter to protect them from advanced cyber threats and unwanted content.

SOURCE DNSFilter