TrueDLP

Data Loss Prevention (DLP) seems to be everywhere right now – and with good reason, given the daily flood of reports of lost, stolen and otherwise breached data. Last month, DLP market analyst Rich Mogull, Securosis security research and advisory firm, circled back to a theme that seems to be popping up everywhere: how to simplify DLP?

In his article (http://securosis.com/blog/comments/top-3-steps-to-simplify-dlp-without-compromise/), Mogull sets the scene by noting “… with massive amounts of content and data streaming throughout the enterprise in support of countless business processes, the idea that we can somehow wrangle this information in any meaningful way, with minimal disruptions to business process, is daunting…”.

Mogull has some good advice for anyone starting a DLP project: take it step by step; he likens it to eating an elephant, bite by bite. Narrow your scope. Consider starting with Network DLP, as many of our customers do, then adding endpoints.  And start with one policy. You can then add another policy as you fine-tune.

We think this is great advice. In addition, we suggest you look at the complexity of the hardware and software you deploy to make sure it will give you what you need without taking over your life. We got started in this business – our only business is DLP, actually – because we saw a growing demand for preventing data loss but a limited set of very complex and kludgy solutions. Why should you have to hire a full-time person to manage just the DLP tool? That’s unrealistic. And why would you want to mess around with 6 or 7 different appliances to manage, update, troubleshoot, and the like? That just does not make sense.

Ask your vendor these questions and determine your scope to get better DLP deployment success. And we’d love to hear from you if you have tips, ideas or comments on Mogull’s advice or on DLP deployment.

Aberdeen Defines Key Characteristics of “Best in Class” DLP Users; What You Can Learn from Them

Last week, Aberdeen Group released its fourth annual report on data loss prevention (DLP). The report, “Content-Aware, The 2010 Data Loss Prevent Report” by analyst Derek Brink, CISSP, concludes “… companies achieving top results successfully use content-aware technologies to identify sensitive data across multiple channels, and to invoke a range of remediation options to enforce their established security policies. In doing so, they reap the substantial benefits of fewer actual incidents of data loss or data exposure, fewer audit deficiencies, and lower operational cost.”

The report details a number of characteristics and practices, as well as hurdles, of top organizations in deploying DLP. While much has been said about the market and choices for DLP, this report is unique in defining what organizations are doing today with DLP and why or why not, as well as metrics.

Interestingly, top performers as identified in this report noted staff bandwidth and complexity of DLP solutions as the big challenges, while others were challenged by organization issues and lack of policy. As we have said over and over, here at Code Green Networks, we believe simplicity and cost-effectiveness are key to DLP success.

So what can you, as an existing or potential user of DLP, learn from these companies? One interesting finding is that for those organizations denoted as best in class, 93% of data loss or exposure incidents were inadvertent – not malicious. This compares to just 65% for all others. Does having a DLP solution in place mean fewer malicious, or deliberate, data exposure incidents? Financially, top performers invested about $90,000 more than others in total cost of DLP but avoided $6.8 million in costs associated with data loss or exposure – 75 times the return on their investment. So-called “laggards” reported an increase of almost 4 times that of best in class brethren in increase in data loss or exposure incidents.

You can get this report and learn how your colleagues and other organizations are using DLP, simply register at http://v1.aberdeen.com/includes/asp/sponsored_registration.asp?ci=/launch/report/benchmark/6575-RA-content-aware-data-loss.asp&spid=30410182&camp=2

Earlier this month Gartner released its 2010 Magic Quadrant for Content-Aware Data Loss Prevention, and we are extremely pleased that the analysts recognize the value and strength of Code Green Network’s easy-to-use, low-cost, content-aware network data loss prevention solution.

“It is very easy to deploy and use for up to 50,000 users, making the overall offering attractive to price sensitive enterprise buyers.”

2010 Magic Quadrant for Content-Aware Data Loss Prevention, Gartner, Inc.
The complete report can be obtained from Gartner Group.

We believe that Gartner and other analysts’ recommendations can be very helpful in sorting through the myriad of products on the market. We suggest taking the Magic Quadrant and the associated analysis into consideration based on your organization’s size, needs and infrastructure.

A key theme emerged in this year’s report: ease-of-use, or as we think about it, simplicity. While data loss prevention (DLP) solutions have existed for some time, they typically have been complex to deploy and manage, and in many cases, engineered as “bolt on” products added to other solutions in the vendor’s product line. Since DLP is our only business, we have focused on simplicity: easy-to-set up, easy-to-deploy, and easy-to-manage. In most cases, our customers get a complete DLP solution in a single appliance, while the same functionality can require up to seven appliances from other vendors. More complex solutions often require a full-time person just to manage them. In contrast, most TrueDLP users spend as little as an hour each week managing DLP:

“I like that minimal IT time is needed to maintain the system. Responding to alerts and refining policies, as management identifies new data to be registered, is all that’s required from me or my team.”
Steve Scott, Information Security Manager, St. Charles Health System

Although price sensitivity is not a theme in this year’s report, as reflective of the vendors in the “Leaders Quadrant”, Code Green Network continues its pioneering position of being a cost effective enterprise solution with the lowest total cost of ownership–providing full features in a single appliance with no complicated licensing fees. Customers can add more seats or locations by adding appliances in a modular way.

The report highlights that 40% of Gartner clients interviewed, led with their network requirements. Gartner states that enterprises that began with network (or endpoint capabilities) nearly always deploy data discovery functions next.

According to Rich Mogul, from the Securosis research and advisory firm, this is because network deployments typically provide the most immediate information with the lowest effort, http://www.securosis.com/tag/data+loss+prevention. We have also seen that same trend.  Almost all of our customers begin with Network DLP, add Discovery capabilities, and then begin to think about Endpoint DLP.

With input from our channel partners and customers, we continue to evolve our solution to strengthen and further expand its capabilities.  Watch for more news on this soon, as well as updates on our ongoing expansion into markets outside North America.