AI Security / 2026 Essentials
Never Execute AI Output Without Validation
Generated code, queries, and markup require controls before another system uses them.
AI-generated content can become a security problem when applications pass it directly to a shell, database, browser, or file operation. OWASP calls this improper output handling. The model’s response should be treated as untrusted input by the next component, even when it looks well formatted.
What matters
- Use parameterised database operations instead of inserting generated text into executable queries.
- Encode or sanitise content for its actual destination, such as HTML rendering.
- Prefer constrained operations with validated parameters over arbitrary generated commands.
Practical example: An assistant proposes a report filter, while application code validates the fields and builds a parameterised query.
One action today: Trace one generated answer into its next system and check which validation happens before execution.