Ladies and Gentlemen, Data has just left the building
The Issue With Modern Day Working
Data protection is fast becoming an issue for business regardless of their size,the risks are there , just not as obvious as it may seem.
Proliferation of devices and modern day working has allowed the ability to access company and personal data from single devices such as smartphones, tablets or laptop’s.
Cloud based storage such as Dropbox has enabled employees to access personal and work information from their finger-tips bringing an important development for data security in companies.
Shadow IT Costs Businesses
Modern day workers are introducing the concept of “Shadow IT” into the workplace, meaning they bring their own way of working from their personal lives into the workplace. IT teams tend to have no visibility or control of these security holes therefore introduce vulnerable data leakage points.
“Did you know that 87 % of senior managers admit to regularly uploading work files to personal email or cloud accounts?”
The statistics really speak for themselves, it is very easy to transfer company sensitive data into personal cloud drives. It is one thing training staff and creating security policies and another actually putting data protection controls in place.
So, business must protect their data and Intellectual property in an ever connected and competitive world . Sensitive data must remain within the security boundaries of a company. Not just physical office security boundaries but also digital boundaries for employees accessing company data outside of office’s.
Key Questions To Ask Yourself As a Business?
This leads us to asses your current environment:
- Where is all your data?
- Can you track any data leakage?
- How can you protect company information?
- Can you guarantee that electronic data you send is only seen by authorised people outside of your company?
So why are answers to these questions important?
Because, data leakages cost money and impact profits , but worse still is the irreparable damage to a company’s reputation. Only last year the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust** was fined £180,000 after a sexual health clinic accidentally leaked personal details of 780 HIV clinic attendees by email.
Upcoming Business Challenges of Not Protecting Data
In the future according to Gartner* one of the top security predictions is that by 2018, the need to prevent data breaches from public clouds will drive 20% of organizations to develop data security governance programs.
“Data security governance will even be promoted by insurance companies who will set cyber premiums based on whether your business has good security governance programs in place.”
Within the next year we are likely to see a variant of the GDPR EU legislation in the UK even after leaving the EU. This will mean that, public and private organizations like you who store data will be required to have a data protection officer who will be a person with expert knowledge of data protection laws and processes.
It is common to see prospective customers asking their potential supplier about their data protection methods before transacting with them.
Summary
In short, as a business owner , data protection is now becoming something more important than ever before. The risks of losing intellectual property to competitors is increasing. Effective data security governance should now be part of a coherent risk mitigation business strategy.
Sources:
*(Gartner Security Predictions by 2018) ; http://www.itnews.com/article/3088084/security/gartner-s-top-10-security-predictions.html?token=%23tk.ITN_nlt_ITnews_Daily_2016-06-24&idg_eid=374760bc8ed90be2002a33ae20c9400f&utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=ITnews%20Daily%202016-06-24&utm_term=ITnews_Daily
**(NHS Trust fined for Data leakage) http://www.itpro.co.uk/data-leakage/26497/nhs-hit-with-180000-fine-for-hiv-patients-data-breach?_mout=1&utm_campaign=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter
Cloudingen Security Team