This is the second blog post in the series “From the Desk of Yoran”.
Yoran 
Sirkis, CEO of Covertix, is a seasoned executive with more than 20 years of experience in information security, specializing in data and physical risk management. He is also a frequent speaker at leading industry conferences.
The ROI from Data-Centric Security
When was the last time you counted the number of security tools in your organization? How many different vendors are involved? What are the maintenance and licensing costs?
I bet you lost count… anyone would.
Companies strive to define and apply security rules that will best protect data, based on their specific business needs. During that process, IT staff encounter evolving security needs and are exposed to an endless amount of solutions—each addressing a valid, real-world security challenge.
As a part of the process of protecting their enterprise data, organizations end up dealing with a variety of vendors, pricey integrations, busy helpdesks, frustrated users and, continuously increasing expenses.
Doing More with Less
As I mentioned in my previous post, The Need for Data-Centric Security, the age of data-centric security transforms the security focus from top-down to bottom-up. It’s this reasoning that makes a data-centric solution more valuable than what it was originally implemented for.
Guided by the understanding and importance of offering a security solution that presents a clear ROI, we have developed a single data-centric solution that delivers much more than file protection.
Data Classification
How many unstructured data files do you think sit on your corporate network? Take a guess. It’s a scary thought, isn’t it? Before you make your team (and yourself) insane by protecting every single file individually, we recommend you take the data classification approach—that’s right, data-centric.
You need a system that easily lets you implement policies across data document types, such as CAD design files from R&D, to files in the accounting department that contain the number 4128 at the start of a 16-digit number.
File Protection
Having a file protection solution in your organization is critical, but most solutions provide limited protection. A data-centric security solution brings much more to the table. It enables organizations to protect, manage, and audit files internally AND externally, to share sensitive information with external users, and to protect information on different devices.
File Encryption
Encrypting files is necessary to ensure your data is protected and is used only by the people it was intended for. Most solutions burden users, forcing them to learn a new system and placing all the responsibility on them.
A data-centric solution removes that burden by offering a system that operates seamlessly and without affecting users’ behavior. This secures your data in all of the following cases:
- After the file has been opened (using any device or location)
- When content is copied/pasted to a new document
- Protection of the file’s metadata
- When sensitive files are shared with external users
Your files are protected, and you can audit and monitor the usage of their content no matter where the files actually reside—inside or outside the organization.
Secure Vaults
Confidential data is often placed within secure vaults. But even the best vaults will only keep your data secure when it is stored within it. A data-centric solution provides persistent security, keeping your data secure anytime and anywhere. From the moment a confidential document is created, through any transport, and even when it is download on any device.
As it is transparently integrated into existing business driven processes with automated rules or manual override, a data-centric security solution will not impose on IT staff and is not dependent on a user’s actions.
Cloud Security
It’s a given that assets residing in the cloud need to be protected. Because of this, cloud providers began offering their own security solutions as well as those from third parties. Of course, the costs begin to pile up and companies are often still uncertain about who else might have access to their cloud-based data.
Deploying a smart, data-centric security solution is the best way to protect your data anywhere—and even from cloud providers themselves.
Data Leak Prevention (DLP)
DLP solutions aim to prevent files from leaving the your business unintentionally or through malicious actions. But how do you protect your data if it is leaked? A data-centric security solution continues to monitor your files even outside the organization and ensures the data they contain remains secure.
And most importantly….
While plenty of solutions secure your data at rest, or in motion, or when it goes to third parties, but only a data-centric solution can secure the file structure and the data it contains so you know that data is always protected.
If you have concerns about your confidential data when it’s in motion, at rest, or in use; and whether it could be lost through a data breach, from a stolen device, or other unintentional or malicious way, we can give you peace of mind. You CAN have a system with a strong ROI, because you won’t find yourself facing lawsuits or losing customers and your reputation.
For more information, please visit www.covertix.com