AURÄI Launches Platform to Strengthen AI Governance, Assurance

Firm warns of widening oversight gaps as businesses deploy AI faster than regulatory frameworks and audit systems can keep pace
A global enterprise artificial intelligence (AI) assurance firm, AURÄI, has launched a platform to help organisations monitor, govern and certify AI operations amid growing concerns over accountability, security and regulatory compliance.
The platform was unveiled on the second day of the 30th anniversary conference of the Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA), Lagos Chapter, held at the Oriental Hotel, Victoria Island, Lagos.
The Founder and Chief Executive Officer of AURÄI, Mr Olayinka James, said the rapid integration of AI into business operations was creating governance gaps that could expose organisations to operational, financial, security and reputational risks.
James, who spoke to auditors, risk management professionals and cybersecurity experts at the conference, said 88 per cent of organisations now used AI in at least one business function, while 93 per cent of internal audit functions deployed the technology in some form.
He, however, said only 38 per cent of audit teams had developed an AI strategy, while the same proportion of organisations had comprehensive policies governing AI tools already in use.
According to him, a typical enterprise now operates more than 150 AI tools unknown to its Information Technology (IT) department, highlighting the growing disconnect between adoption and oversight.
“Adoption everywhere. Assurance almost nowhere,” he said.
James said banks were deploying AI models for credit assessments and fraud detection, while fintech companies were integrating foundational AI models into their products faster than policies could address the associated risks.
He added that government agencies were also piloting AI systems capable of directly affecting citizens, making effective monitoring and accountability increasingly necessary.
Drawing parallels with the technology-driven corporate scandals of the early 2000s, James said the current AI transformation could trigger a similar regulatory and professional reckoning.
He recalled that the widespread adoption of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems and electronic ledgers in the late 1990s was followed by the collapse of Enron and WorldCom in 2001 and 2002, as well as the disappearance of audit giant Arthur Andersen.
He said the developments culminated in the enactment of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, which strengthened corporate accountability by requiring executives to certify internal controls and helped establish IT auditing as a specialised profession.
He noted that the emergence of the Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA) certification was also part of the professional evolution that followed.
James, however, said the current AI revolution presented a more complex challenge because machines were increasingly making decisions rather than merely recording them.
“This time the machines are not recording the decisions. They are making them — credit, claims, benefits, identity — at machine speed and population scale,” he said.
Describing the summer of 2026 as a critical period for AI oversight, James cited several security incidents, industry developments and regulatory responses as evidence of the growing urgency for stronger safeguards.
Among the incidents he referenced were about 1,200 AI agents linked to a breach involving Hugging Face in July, a reported two-week pause in reinforcement learning development by OpenAI in August, the resignation of an Anthropic researcher and Google’s Gemini reportedly escaping a test sandbox into three real companies.
He also cited a breach involving Australia’s Medicare portal as an indication of the security implications of deploying AI systems without adequate safeguards.
On regulation, James referenced California’s SB 813 and AB 1405, which he said mandated independent AI auditors and a state registry.
He also cited a White House Accord committing frontier AI laboratories to independent external audits and board-level oversight, alongside 12 additional AI laws signed in California on Oct. 1.
According to him, the pace of regulatory responses suggested that the world was approaching what he described as an “AI SOX moment”.
He observed that while it took about 10 months from Enron’s collapse to the enactment of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, the current AI developments had produced a comparable reckoning in about seven weeks.
Against this backdrop, James said AURÄI was positioning itself to support the emergence of a new professional field focused on AI assurance, requiring experts capable of assessing, monitoring and certifying AI operations.
Explaining the platform, he said it combined AI agents that automate governance, risk and compliance activities with trained professionals responsible for supervising their work.
He said its capabilities included AI system discovery, evidence collection, control testing, policy drafting and audit documentation.
According to him, the agents operate within defined boundaries and document their activities, while certified professionals review their outputs, challenge findings and approve critical decisions.
“AI agents should escalate to human judgement instead of guessing,” he said.
James said the company was also introducing training and certification programmes to equip professionals with the expertise required to operate its AI agents and supervise their execution.
He said professionals who acquired AI-related skills would be better positioned to remain relevant as organisations increasingly integrated the technology into their operations.
“AI will not take your job. Someone who mastered it will,” he said.
James said the business model was informed by recurring challenges he encountered during more than 20 years in enterprise auditing and cybersecurity roles at Deloitte, PwC, Citigroup, GE Digital and Zimmer Biomet.
He said his experience showed that although many organisations had sound governance frameworks, they often struggled with effective implementation.
“The same pattern repeated everywhere: the frameworks were sound, the execution was broken,” he said.
He added that regulations such as the European Union’s AI Act were introducing stricter requirements around risk management, transparency and human oversight, making it necessary for organisations to demonstrate that their AI systems were properly governed.
James said AURÄI was designed to help enterprises generate the evidence required by internal assurance teams, external auditors, regulators and corporate boards.
The company was co-founded by James, Mr Mohammed Mijindadi and Mr Chris Kanwei, whose professional backgrounds span enterprise auditing, cybersecurity, infrastructure development and institutional investment.