Data Loss Prevention

Data loss prevention definition

Data protection is everyone’s job, not just an IT function. Data loss prevention (DLP) is part of a company’s security policy to prevent the loss, leakage, misuse, or access of data by unauthorized parties. As part of their DLP practices, organizations also classify business-critical information to ensure that the policies in place comply with relevant regulations, such as HIPAA and GDPR.

Data loss prevention tools and solutions can monitor, remotely control, and safeguard data living on endpoint devices, corporate applications, and cloud and on-premises environments. Whether in flight or at rest, DLP solutions insulate organizations from internal and external threats which can result in the purposeful or accidental loss of data.

We recommend a proactive strategy, utilizing robust data loss prevention tools to avoid costly and damaging events.

What is data loss prevention?

As the name implies, data loss prevention is a proactive posture aimed at securing data and digital resources against potential theft, accidental and malicious loss. As part of an organization’s security strategy, data protection optimization safeguards valuable data – instilling high levels of recoverability from a loss event. Data loss protection applies to the full data lifecycle, including when it is in transit traversing the network, stored at rest, or actively in used by applications.

DLP solutions can expedite incident response by providing alerts and isolating data in the event of a cyberattack or breach. Data loss prevention tools are also capable of classifying company information to ensure that data policies comply with relevant internal, local, government, and industry-mandated regulatory requirements.

What is data loss prevention, and how does it work?

As noted earlier, data loss prevention helps companies protect their data from accidental and malicious events. Dedicated solutions maintain pristine copies of production data in separate locations, expediting recovery from loss, while maintaining compliance with regulatory requirements. The main aspects of data loss prevention tools include:

• Security. Advanced encryption and zero-trust access controls to prevent unwarranted access to backup data.
• Detection. Rapidly identifies and alerts users of potential cyberattack by monitoring anomalies and abnormal file pattern activity.
• Preservation. Immutable data copies in an isolated, air-gapped location – to prohibit any altering, deleting, or tampering with data.
• Recovery. High availability of backup data, capable of meeting data recovery targets and SLAs.
• Control. Robust and flexible search and recovery tools to administer the granular or wholesale restoration of data.

Why is data loss prevention important?

Data loss comes in many shapes and sizes. From accidental deletion, to malicious internal users, to advanced malware, data loss is classified as any event that results in the material loss of digitally stored information. Cyberattack incidents, for one, are on the rise as new vulnerabilities surface with the rapid shift to new work-from-home and distance learning models. Even in 2019, nearly 60% of enterprises experienced a ransomware attack.

While all users expect to have the data accessible and available around the clock, data loss events not only cause business downtime, but can result in permanent data loss. Without proper data protection optimization, companies are more likely than not to lose data and experience business disruptions. In short, DLP offers organizations a robust layer of data loss protection, accelerates response to incidents and helps in maintaining regulatory compliance.

Benefits of data loss prevention

Digital data and applications are the drivers of business growth. Protecting business-critical data is vital for business survival and serves as a safety net against data loss or theft. Preventing data loss is getting harder every moment with more data to store and more places to store it. Adopting and enforcing a DLP strategy is a cornerstone of keeping your valuable data out of the wrong hand. DLP offers a helping hand to IT teams for:

Rapid recovery. Data loss prevention tools provide administrators with requisite tools and capabilities to restore data with speed and precision. With granular search and flexible point-in-time or out-of-place recovery options, IT teams have complete control over when, where, and how to restore valuable data.

Comprehensive coverage.  DLP extends protection across data estates, offering comprehensive coverage for users, systems, applications, and environments. And with data scattered in many cloud and on-premises locations – dedicated solutions deliver better peace of mind and coverage for valuable organizational data.

Lower costs. Data loss prevention saves organizations countless resources by avoiding potential liabilities, harmful exposure, fines and lost revenue due to data loss.

Common use cases for data loss prevention

Organizations of all sizes need protection against todays internal and external threats. Proper data protection allows customers to deploy solutions in everyday use cases:

• Data loss protection. Data loss prevention tools add a 360-degree view of data assets and prevents loss due to deletion, corruption and attack.  Data loss prevention preserves the integrity of your data and maintains preserved copies for rapid recovery.
• Regulatory compliance. With more data to store in more places, maintaining regulatory compliance with ever-increasing regulatory requirements is getting harder every day. DLP provides and overarching solution that helps classify information to ensure that it remains compliant with internal and external standards and protocols.
• Sustained business continuity. With new workplace models, advancements in IoT and new edge computing, and the rapid increase in cybercrime, data loss is more prevalent than ever. Organizations who proactively institute data loss prevention tools ensure their organizations (and their data) stay resilient in the face of new challenges and emerging data loss threats.

Does Metallic offer data loss prevention?

Yes! Metallic Backup as a Service (Baas) solution, from the minds of Commvault, supports a wide range of data loss protection services. Built exclusively on Microsoft Azure, Metallic delivers enterprise-grade data protection – with the simplicity of SaaS.  From preserving data with air-gapped copies, to advanced security preventing unwarranted access or attack, to robust recovery controls, Metallic offers award-winning data loss protection to comprehensively safeguard your digital assets. With broad-ranging coverage across apps, endpoints, on-prem, and cloud environments, it’s proven to keep valuable data available, recoverable, and compliant.