Data Security
According to the FBI’s National Crime Information Center, laptop thefts increased 48% for the last two years. The Pomenon Institute estimates that 12,000 laptops stolen from airports every week!
So, what can you do to protect yourself? Well there is always the obvious, keep track of your laptop at all times. But what if it gets stolen?
1) Make sure you have a good backup of your data. This is one of those things that needs to ‘just happen’. Here at GQ we use the Mozy backup server and also resell the service with some value add. The beauty of these services are they just work, and do it all in the background. Everyday without my knowledge or intervention, my critical data gets encrypted and backed-up to a remote data center.
2) If you have valuable or sensitive data, encrypt it! We all hear the news stories about a kid getting a used iPod form a pawn shop with some organizations HR data including social security numbers on it. We all need to do a better job about controlling the data on our laptops and for that data we NEED on our laptop that is sensitive, it should be encrypted. As a warning, not all encryption programs are created equal and you should talk to someone before you do this.
Two simple things that can 1) ensure your data is still available to you and not lost forever and 2) the data on your stolen laptop cannot be accessed by anyone else.
On a side note… Be careful backing up or storing sensitive data on USB Drives. Not all USB drives are created equal and since you can not store loads of data on them you need to be careful. Companies like Sandisk and their Cruzer Enterprise will encrypt the data automatically and password protect it, all without user intervention.
There is a theme here, make data security a part of your companies everyday life. Make it seamless and easy. Create the process so the users cannot get around it. If you don’t have a security plan, create one. It doesn’t need to be long or complex but having one can go a long way.
Hope this helps…and be safe out there!
Karl Weir
Director of Consulting, Globalquest Solutions Inc.
Tags: Technology Today
