Data Protection from Endpoint to Cloud

Fig. 1: Important Data Security and Protection

In today’s business, data has been on the move more than ever with the advent of technological devices, raising the possibility of more cyber-attacks on the business’s data infrastructures. In this scenario, most, if not all, data vulnerabilities often occur at the endpoints, particularly on laptops, flash drives, and smart devices, and moving across virtual or physical systems and cloud infrastructures. It is at this point where customer information, business financial data, intellectual property, or trade secrets could be stolen or lost along the way. Securing all of these data is much more complicated by several increasing risk factors such as the following, to wit; 

● Continuous growth of workforce mobility.

● Rising rate of APTs (Advanced Persistent Threats) and Data Breach Incidents.

● Fast-evolving compliance regulations and mandates.

● Workforces choice of using their own mobile devices and apps for work 

For businesses to steer clear of embarrassments, revenue losses, damage to the business’s reputation, and fines due to breaches of the business data infrastructures, businesses must be able to quickly identify, monitor, track, and secure all confidential data from multiple points within the organization without affecting workforce productivity and performance. The issue here is that conventional endpoint security mechanisms very often use an architecture that is not so different from the usual server-centric systems that have been in use in the data center.

Fig. 2: Traditional server-centric architecture | Photo Source: mycloudwiki

In the past, scores of organizations tried the conventional DLP (Data Loss Prevention) solution but eventually dissed it for reasons that they are too obtrusive, too expensive to obtain, deploy, and maintain, and too complex to administer. This legacy method of approaches very often needs time-honored software-distribution medium and heavy network authentication methods - of which none are advantageous to the present-day and particularly disconnected devices of today. 

Why Need Cloud Data Protection? 

Businesses of today transfer data to the cloud and store it in various locations, adding another level of difficulty to the already complex situations. Added to it is the introduction of several security difficulties. The data stems from businesses steadily producing, gathering, and storing large volumes of sensitive information, including trade secrets and sensitive client data. And these locations range from basic private and public cloud resources to complex architectures like hybrid clouds, and SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) solutions, to name a few. These challenges are compounded by the increasingly strict data privacy and protection laws and shared accountability models adopted by cloud vendors like AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud Platform (GCP).

The most significant challenges are: 

1.    1.   Clients cannot guarantee data security. Keeping tab of a perfect record of all applications and data is complicated. While it is true that cloud users have more control over some security features and shared responsibility models are also offered by vendors and suppliers, most are still under the vendor's control.

·        2.  Vulnerability to breaches. In contrast to an on-premises infrastructure, fewer restrictions over applications and data housed on a third-party infrastructure make them more vulnerable to breaches. In short, it is not always feasible to see what users or colleagues are doing and discover how their data or devices are used. 

 1.   3.  Cloud data protection and security. This is all true. All single cloud vendors provide different data security characteristics, resulting in inconsistent cloud data protection and security. 

These concerns may be taken advantage of by unscrupulous threat actors which may result in malware or ransomware infections, and primarily in the loss or theft of company secrets, financial or private information. So, a Data Loss Prevention (DLP) policy is necessary.

McAfee's Total Protection for Data Loss Prevention (TPDLP), built from the ground up, effectively and quickly protects an organization's data wherever it may be. With its TPDLP solutions, it is easy to get the solution up and running, delivering it as a simple component that can immediately start analyzing data in minutes and not in months. So, why waste precious time and money? Furthermore, McAfee’s TPDLP protects the organization's very important data such as intellectual property and ensures compliance by securing sensitive data wherever it is located on the network, storage systems or at the endpoint, thereby saving time with its concentrated management, deployment, and reporting. It integrates tightly with other data protection solutions, such as encryption, web security, and email security providing the ultimate data protection for data at rest, data in motion and data at rest. 

Likewise, Trend Micro™ Integrated DLP, with its lightweight plug-in can quickly and easily gain visibility and control of sensitive data and avert data loss via email, USB, and the web. Trend Micro™ Integrated DLP plug-in needs no additional software or hardware, and it leverages the organization’s built-in regional and industry-wide specific templates for simpler deployment. 

To successfully ensure endpoint data backup, including security-related best practices in device encryption, remote wiping, and many more, two mandates should be taken into consideration, to wit; 

1. Data protection must be lightweight. Onerous installation, configuration, and/or procedural changes that are counterintuitive will most likely result in data that is not sufficiently protected. 

2. IT must have high visibility in ensuring that backups are occurring and that accessibility forms part of the recovery solution instead of being part of a backup problem. This second requirement will define the variation between the organization-credible products and consumer endpoint offerings. 

Combining these two mandates correctly will empower IT in ensuring corporate compliance for data security with the very same retention directives as corporate servers do, while users are unrestricted by the backup. 

With files safely secured, protected, and backed up to any versatile deployment options, organizations can easily rest, knowing that even if any one of the computers crashes, data can be restored.

 

 

About JPA 

Jose Richard P. Archival has been writing articles on KPO/BPO industries for several years, specializing in electronics, DAS (Distributed Antenna System), travel, and the home & office industry. A one-time manufacturer and exporter of furniture internationally. Graduated from college with a Bachelor of Science in Electronics and Communications Engineering and a post-graduate master’s in business administration. Also, exploring the outdoors is an escape… nothing bets nature!