Safeguarding Financial Institutions with Data Loss Prevention Software

Posted by Tomas Cohen on August 17th, 2014

A major threat facing modern enterprises is a breach of their confidential data. Businesses can prevent breaches by employing technologies like data loss prevention software. According to Tricore research analyst, Catherine Rose, “Nowadays, more and more enterprises are creating and implementing data loss prevention policies and regulations”. As the adoption of cloud storage is skyrocketing, companies are looking to increase their control over the cloud.

According to a CISO survey conducted by research group, Gartner, data loss prevention software is considered to be one of the foremost priorities of enterprise security since 2012. Data loss prevention software is able to first, discover private information, then follow its access and transfer paths, and finally block the unauthorized access and/or transfer to other locations via the cloud.

Data loss prevention tools are particularly of high concern and interest to financial institutions, according to research firm Warburton Associates. Given the increase of data breaches and leaks, specifically targeting sensitive data such as medical records, financial information, and credit card numbers, financial institutions must leverage tools such as data loss prevention software to keep themselves safe. Robert Honeywell, founder of the Warburg Capital Group reinforces this notion, giving his vote of confidence by stating, “Data loss prevention software has been influential in securing our business, and now proven to secure the systems and data of many other large enterprises as well.”

Data loss prevention software has also proven effective in the case of the West Manchester Capital Group. The West Manchester Capital Group recently barely evaded a possible catastrophe via data loss prevention software. In this particular situation, a new employee tried to transfer confidential client information to their personal cloud storage in the cloud. Upon discovering this anomalous activity, the data loss prevention software immediately prevented the file sending, blocking the catastrophe completely. Travis Nielsen, information technology manager at the West Manchester Capital Group, chimes in, providing his confidence in data loss prevention stating, “data loss prevention is incredible as it’s able to identify your sensitive information, track its transfers, and prevent any malicious transfers.”

Furthermore, beyond malevolent hackers and cyber attackers, its possible a non-malicious employee might accidentally break a company rule. In such a case, data loss prevention can prevent an unintentional mistake that could cost a company millions. However, without the proper technology of data loss prevention, no company regulation or human relations policy can save your company. Thus, its important that enterprises take the responsibility of preventing data breaches and leaks, as a service to their customer, and to prevent the irrevocable damage to the brand. In some cases, breach or leak damage has been so costly, that it’s vastly exceeded the cost of the data loss prevention itself, by multiples surpassing 5x.

To conclude, data loss prevention software is an extraordinary tool that can be employed by financial institutions. There onwards, financial institutions can protect their sensitive information, which can span credit card numbers and bank account numbers. Data loss prevention software is a bank’s best bet against money hungry cyber criminals.

Author:

Tomas Cohen is a security enthusiast and analyst covering the most significant security topics and trends prevalent worldwide. He also involves in the technology related to Cloud Security, Data Loss Prevention, Box Security etc.,