Enterprise buyers: “Prove it.”
Security reviews used to show up after a pilot. Today, they show up before the pilot. Buyers ask how you handle customer data, where models run, who can see prompts, and whether you’ll train on their inputs.
Signals that move deals forward
- Clear data stance: If you say “no training on customer data,” enforce it technically and document it.
- Access boundaries: Prompt/content logs limited to least-privileged staff; redaction for sensitive fields.
- Traceability: Every output is linked to model version + dataset version + code version.
- Vendor posture: Subprocessors listed; regions documented; termination/export plan in place.
Minimal viable SOC2 track
You can get “SOC2-ready” signals fast without halting product work:
- Controls mapped to code: Access via SSO/MFA. PR reviews required. CI artifacts retained. Deploy logs searchable.
- Asset inventory: Know which services store PII/PHI and where keys live. Eliminate shadow databases.
- Incidents & drills: Define severity levels; who’s on-call; how you notify customers. Run one tabletop.
- Security hygiene: Dependency scanning, container image scanning, and monthly patch cadence.
AI-specific risk trims
- Prompt & output filtering: Block obvious abuse; document unacceptable use.
- Human-in-the-loop gates: For high-risk actions (e.g., sending customer communications), require approval.
- Evaluation harness: Track quality and harmful output rates by model version.
- Contract alignment: Contract language must reflect actual product behavior (training, retention, export).
Proof without bureaucracy
Turn your existing engineering work into evidence:
- Link deployments to PRs; keep logs for 90–180 days.
- Tag artifacts with model + data + app versions.
- Keep a living Controls Map README that ties policies → code → dashboards.
The result
With these small but strong signals, security reviews become faster, pilots start sooner, and sales cycles shrink—without burying the team in paperwork.
Want a fast pass? I help teams put these signals in place in weeks as a fractional CTO. hello@ctodirect.io • Book a 20-min intro