As of 2021, we are creating 1.145 trillion MB of data per day. And come 2025, we will have up to 463 exabytes of data at our hands each day. However, this is not even the most exciting part. As we continue to generate, consume, and deal with so much data every day, the wave of security breaches is on the rise. More and more organizations face crippling data breaches – the pandemic and remote work situation only complicate matters further. On April 14, 2020, the credentials of over 500K Zoom teleconferencing accounts were found for sale on the dark web. As alarming as that sounds, only one of the 3950 confirmed data breaches occurred during the year. The spiraling data exposure and theft situation has contributed to an increasing need for information security. Today, more than ever, data handling and management have become a global cause of concern. While organizations are thoroughly acquainted with GDPR and the strict provisions that come with it, there is a visible shift towards data security globally. The introduction of the draft data security law in China and UAE issuing its first Federal sector-wide Data Protection Law are just some recent examples.
But does it neutralize the threat? Not even close.
While organizations step up to meet data privacy regulations and update their processes, internal and external data threats are becoming more advanced. Thus, data security, the first step to data privacy, holds more merit than ever. And the first step towards securing personal data is to classify and understand it. Using data discovery solutions can help businesses pinpoint sensitive and confidential data on an ongoing basis, thus helping them stay atop the ever-changing data landscape.
Understanding Data Discovery and Classification in Times of Breach
Whether it is the Zoom data leak we talked about earlier or Microsoft’s customer records left exposed on the dark web in early 2020 – data breaches are swiftly becoming the reality of today’s digital world. And with more and more organizations taking the cloud route, the amount of data at risk is only multiplying. However, organizations can strengthen their first defense against any security threats with the right automated data discovery solutions in place. They say knowledge is power, and knowing your data vulnerabilities firsthand is probably the best response to data threats. With complete data cataloging or inventory, you gain context into sensitive data and thus guide efforts to reduce data risk and address audit and compliance needs.
Why Organizations Need Data Discovery Solutions Now More than Ever
It’s not just about preventing or responding to data breaches. Organizations handling personal data also understand the importance of keeping the data clean and readily available. But even the most equipped teams cannot do this without the right tools. You need automated solutions that flag sensitive data and monitor the transfer and copy of personal data and classify a wide range of data types. Deploying an AI-powered data discovery solution is the answer. This crucial first step can protect organizations from cybersecurity threats, data breaches, or regulatory non-compliance. Automated data discovery solutions help your team locate sensitive data and take informed actions based on the insights they uncover. Secuvy’s Data Discovery solution employs contextual Artificial Intelligence, which allows for the real-time discovery of personal data and user correlation. Easily collect, organize, and create a live data catalog to address privacy, security, and governance requirements.
Get Insights into Your Data
Today organizations deal with multitudes of structured and unstructured data, both on-premise and in the cloud. To navigate this complex data landscape and protect this data from any security threats, you need complete insight into the information you hold. Using the Secuvy Data Discovery solution, you can scan data across locations and systems and get insight into whether or not it is sensitive or at-risk.
Best-in-class Classification
The next logical step is to classify data – this helps your security teams prioritize sensitive or high-risk data protection. For instance, a particular form of data may not pose a threat individually, but it can become a highly sensitive classification when combined with other data formats. Secuvy auto-classifies your data to help run your business more efficiently while also laying a solid and secure foundation for future expansion. Our Advanced Data Classification solution is simple to introduce and implement data policies, monitor and improve awareness of data usage across the business.
Risk and Remediation Management
Identifying data threats is just one part of data privacy and security management. The other crucial part is Remediation. With Secuvy, organizations can better protect the at-risk data with automated mechanisms. Our IT risk management solutions can help connect digital infrastructure, monitor risk across business operations, and provide a holistic 360 degree view of data risks.
Monitoring and Limiting Data Access
Understanding who can access data within your organization or outside can help security teams prevent the threat of data leaks. With Secuvy data discovery solutions, your team can see who has access to what data and where it is stored. Secuvy Data Discovery also helps companies identify and locate any files with open access and take the relevant actions to restrict access and minimize the risk of a potentially serious data breach. Automated data discovery helps security teams design efficient data protection frameworks by locating and identifying sensitive data precisely and classifying data into risk-based categories. It ensures that all data security and privacy gaps are duly addressed. With Secuvy Data Discovery solutions, you can focus on critical areas of data security and privacy from day one.
Conclusion
As organizations grow and we continue to collect and create unstructured data, the risk of information breaches significantly increases. And to mitigate these risks, security teams need automated insights into the ‘what, who, where, and why’ of data. Using automated data discovery solutions, security teams can gather and filter data from various sources and determine which information is crucial to know and act on it quickly. After all, knowledge is power.
