41% of companies make prevention of data leaks a priority task

The leakage of confidential data – whether by accident or malicious design – can have serious consequences for any company, and in the worst cases might even cause a business to collapse. The results of a survey conducted by the IDC marketing agency in December 2012 show that many companies recognise the gravity of the problem – 41% of companies are genuinely concerned about possible data leaks and have made prevention a primary objective. According to IDC, encryption – one of the most effective and reliable data protection tools – is becoming more and more popular.

Four reasons to implement encryption technologies:
Generally encryption technologies fall into two camps – File and Folder Level Encryption (FLE) or Full Disk Encryption (FDE). FLE protects specific files and folders so it’s better suited for encrypting small amounts of sensitive information. FDE, by contrast, encrypts the entire hard drive and is perfect for protecting, for example, corporate laptops in the event of them being lost or stolen. Since FLE and FDE solve different problems, most organisations prefer to use both technologies.

According to the IDC specialists, there are four main reasons to implement encryption technologies:

• To limit access to confidential information and to protect against unauthorised access;
• To protect sensitive files against malware and other increasingly prevalent cyber-threats;
• To help secure data against attacks that successfully penetrate the corporate network – attacks on corporate infrastructure and attempts at data theft are becoming ever more sophisticated;
• To complement a company’s risk management process; data protection plays an increasingly important role as a key element here.

Currently, encryption-related expenditure is not a priority item in most IT department budgets. However, IDC analysts are sure encryption will soon become one of the most in-demand technologies.

According to IDC, the market for workstation encryption will grow by more than 50% in the next few years – from $556 million in 2012 to $866 million in 2016. In 2013, the cost of data protection will exceed $2 billion for the first time while in 2016 it will reach more than $3 billion.

Kaspersky Lab encryption technologies:
To prevent unauthorised access to confidential information, our new corporate platform Kaspersky Endpoint Security for Business offers both FDE and FLE encryption technologies. The solution incorporates several other valuable features, including centralised management functions for encryption technologies via Kaspersky Security Centre, the ability to set up general rules to encrypt data on external media, and the automatic encryption of files created or modified by any programme specified by the company’s IT staff.

It is important to reduce the complexity in the IT environment, and Kaspersky Endpoint Security for Business allows companies to eliminate several different tools, vendors and applications by consolidating their needs into a single platform. To help reduce complexity, the encryption function is combined with a wide range of other Kaspersky Lab technologies in this new platform. It protects against malware, spam, targeted threats and other cyber threats, creating a truly safe environment to handle confidential information on all nodes of the company’s infrastructure.