AI Use By Forrester
AI is rapidly becoming an important component of many products and services businesses use to operate. Following the recommendations from Forrester’s own research, we have been focused on incorporating AI products, services, tools, and enhancements (“AI Tools”) into our business in order to improve our client-facing services and increase business productivity. As AI becomes integrated into our ecosystem, we understand clients may have questions about how it is being utilized. Although AI is a new technology, the main concern is often the same as with traditional technology tools: ensuring client confidential information is safe and secure. Additionally, Forrester wants to reassure our clients that AI will enhance, not degrade, our products and services. Forrester remains committed to the integrity of our research and deliverables by maintaining thoughtful oversight over AI usage.
We are addressing this evolving technology in the following ways:
Forrester ensures third-party AI Tools that we use in our business go through a detailed security review.
- We will only approve AI Tools that demonstrate a commitment to providing industry- standard protections for the safety and security of the service, including any data and information processed through the AI Tool.
Forrester will not upload, share or otherwise process any client confidential information or personal data through any third-party AI Tool that uses such information or data for training an AI model.
- We will ensure vendors are contractually prohibited from such usage and/or implement technical limitations to prevent any such usage by a vendor.
Forrester has developed a client-facing AI Tool called Izola, which is a modified LLM (large language model) that has been improved with Forrester’s research and materials only.
- We do not train Izola with any data, confidential information or other materials that clients have provided to us in connection with our commercial relationship.
- To learn more about Izola, please see below and review our Izola FAQs.
Forrester has internal policies to ensure appropriate use of AI by our employees.
- Our policies require that employees use only approved, vetted AI Tools and that employees maintain the confidentiality of client confidential information and personal data.
Forrester is committed to the integrity of our research and deliverables by ensuring human experts develop our content.
- We strongly believe that deep analysis and insights need to come from our industry-leading human experts. We will only use AI to assist in the early stages of our research process. Any AI-generated content will be thoroughly reviewed, fact-checked, revised and built upon through our rigorous expert-led research process.
Research inquiries, guidance sessions and customer support services will still be led by our employees.
- We value direct human relationships. Our skilled analysts will guide subscribing clients through our research in inquiry and guidance sessions and our highly trained account representatives will help answer account management questions.
- Of course, you may choose to utilize Izola as an efficient personal research tool.
Forrester will comply with all applicable laws regarding AI.
- We will monitor the changing legal landscape for AI regulations that affect our business.
AI Use by Forrester’s Clients
We encourage our clients to use AI in meaningful and creative ways. However, as Forrester’s research, information, data and other materials (“Forrester IP”) are proprietary and extremely important to our company, we need to ensure that they remain protected and accessible only to paying clients. Just as we protect our clients’ confidential materials, we expect our clients to ensure the protection of our IP, in line with their contractual commitments to us. This section addresses how our clients (and other parties) may use AI with respect to Forrester’s content and sites.
I. Izola – Forrester’s GenAI Tool
Forrester has created an in-house generative AI Tool for eligible license holders to use to interact with Forrester’s research in a secure and approved manner. Izola is trained on Forrester’s proprietary research materials and allows users to quickly get synthesized answers based on Forrester’s reports and blogs and to find supporting materials. Clients may leverage this approved AI Tool to help make their research more effective and efficient. Izola balances our clients’ demands to leverage AI while ensuring protections for our IP.
Izola is meant for a licensed user’s own research and learning. Therefore, a user may only share limited amounts of the Izola output for their own internal company presentations and may not share any Izola output externally, in the same way that any other Forrester IP may or may not be shared. Please review your contract terms and our Client Resources and FAQ for more details on sharing of Forrester IP. As with any AI Tool, there is a risk of inaccuracies or “hallucinations” in the output, and thus we strongly recommend reviewing the Forrester materials cited to ensure accuracy and context. For more information on Izola, please visit the Izola FAQs. Izola is currently available to clients with certain subscription packages; please speak to your representative if you would like access.
II. Client and Third-Party AI Tools
Forrester recognizes that many clients plan to utilize third-party or internally developed AI Tools in their business. While we encourage clients to use AI Tools to help in their everyday productivity, Forrester must ensure that its IP is protected and that its proprietary materials are not utilized with software, tools or applications that may not be secure or may use our materials to train or build AI models. Therefore, Izola is the only approved AI Tool to use to interact with any Forrester IP and the following are prohibited:
- Uploading, sharing, distributing, inputting, reading, scraping or scanning Forrester IP with large language models or any AI Tools other than Forrester’s Izola.
- Training an AI Tool based on Forrester IP.
- Assigning a Forrester user license to an AI Tool or otherwise allowing an AI Tool to access Forrester’s research platform.
- Uploading, sharing, distributing or otherwise inputting any materials, data, information, recordings, notes or transcriptions from conversations or sessions with a Forrester analyst or consultant into an AI Tool.
However, clients may use an AI Tool to help transcribe or take notes during its session with a Forrester analyst IF such session is allowed to be recorded per the Recording Guidelines.
If there is a use case that you are not sure about or you have any questions about our AI Policy, please feel free to contact us at compliance@forrester.com.
Last Updated: September 23, 2024. As AI is a rapidly evolving technology, the policies above may be modified. Please regularly check this page for any updates.