As cyber threats grow in volume, the need to have efficient and rigid data prevention strategies increases to have a safer place for the organizations to operate. Companies nowadays need to build a secure network for their operations to protect their sensitive data. Data exfiltration and destruction are the two most significant causes of concern for businesses. Detecting the vulnerabilities and tracking their behavior on your systems is their ultimate goal for protecting data loss. Organizations nowadays have several options in front of them to protect their data. This blog will help you understand everything about data loss prevention (DLP). So, let’s get started!!
What is Data Loss Prevention (DLP)?
DLP is a widely used term to indicate the overall process of detecting and preventing data breaches, exfiltration, destruction, etc., of organizations’ sensitive data. It is widely popular for protecting organizations from unexpected data loss and leakage, such as ransomware attacks. It is used to protect against insider and outsider threats of the organizations.
Different Types of DLP technologies
Network DLP
As the name suggests, network DLP helps protect the data roaming within the organization’s network by putting a secure perimeter around it. Suppose an employee tries to steal the organization’s data using an email. The DLP software can easily track whenever the users try to move the information outside the network using sensitive email information.
It can take various pre-programmed actions, including encrypting, blocking, quarantining, or email auditing. This is among the most effective methods used when an organization has computers connected to a network within the organization only and not the laptops and devices roaming away from the network area.
Endpoint DLP
Endpoint DLP is one of the most sought-after DLP technologies organizations use in this remote work era. Organizations these days put a lot of trust in their employees by handling their vulnerable information on endpoint devices such as mobiles or laptops, servers, computers, etc.
Endpoint DLP helps organizations protect from a data breach by detecting and tracking users’ activities and preventing all such risks associated with data loss by blocking access to all unauthorized individuals.
Cloud DLP
Cloud DLP is a practical step taken by organizations to protect their sensitive information from vulnerabilities of the cloud environment. As top companies move to cloud servers for managing their business operations, challenges arise to protect their sensitive data from the cloud environment’s vulnerabilities.
In Cloud DLP, it doesn’t use any security perimeter for data prevention. Instead, integrate with several cloud-based tools for better protection. This technology helps eliminate the risks associated with the cloud networks of the organization so that the employees can use the apps or storage without any security threat.
How DLP eliminate Data Exfiltration?
Do you know organizations suffer the most due to extreme data exfiltration activities on their networks? It is also known as data extrusion, leading to huge losses. Data extrusion refers to the various methods used to move the organization’s data without authorization. One of the primary goals of the DLP process is to protect the data from extrusion, which can be done using several ways:
- Transfer of data outside the organization using email or instant messaging.
- Stealing data using an external hard drive without authorization.
- Transmitting an organization’s data to the public cloud by a user.
- A hacker gaining unauthorized access to the organization’s data leading to data leakage.
The role of DLP is to detect and prevent the data before leaving the organization. It helps keep track of the organization’s entire network and blocks access in case of any threat related to data extrusion.
What techniques does DLP use for detecting sensitive data?
DLP technology uses several methods to detect sensitive data in an organization’s network. Here we will show you some of them:
Data fingerprint
With data fingerprinting, DLP helps secure all the confidential files from going outside the organization’s network. A DLP creates a unique fingerprint for each file saved to the servers and designates the same fingerprint to their copies. So, whenever a DLP scans an outgoing file whose fingerprint matches the same file, it blocks the access or notifies the administrator regarding the same activity.
Keyword Detection
Keyword detection is the ultimate strategy organizations use to control all the outgoing mail containing the keyword. Suppose an organization wants to protect its confidential report. They configure the DLP with the specific keyword to block all the outgoing files matching the same keyword. It is an excellent way to control the sensitive data moving away from the organization’s network.
Pattern similarity
Another Data Loss Prevention technique organizations use to scan all the information is to move away from the organization that contains a specific pattern. This helps significantly protect sensitive information such as card details or other financial details. It classifies the text by assuming it will fit into a particular category of protected data. If an email contains a 16-digits number, the DLP system classifies the string of the HTML to match the pattern.
File Detection
Under this, a DLP technology classifies the hash of the file, moving away from the organization’s network and matching them with the hashes of the protected files. So that whenever someone tries to steal the file from the organization’s server, it compares the hashes of both the files and block the access by informing the administrator.
Exact data identification
Attackers or intruders now have several ways to steal data from the organization’s server. With the help of exact data identification, organizations configure DLP to match the actual data present in the file from the ones moving away from the networks. This helps block all the ways a user tries to steal the organization’s sensitive data.
For more information regarding DLP and the various technologies, keep reading Webstealer. We will help you get ahead of the vulnerabilities to operate freely in the digital environment.