You can’t secure what you can’t see: the data challenge

The tidal wave of data

Data is undoubtedly a key asset today, but all it takes is a breach to turn it into a dreaded liability. With more data generated than ever, organizations have a hard time tracking and storing it. Approximately 402.74 million terabytes of data are produced each day on average. To put this into perspective, this amount of storage can hold roughly 100 billion high-definition movies.

Does more data mean more risks?

With GenAI in play, data generation has skyrocketed further. However, the lack of data security measures leads to data breaches, often causing operational and financial disruptions, and also inviting regulatory intervention. There are many examples of weak security policies leading to breaches. Change Healthcare, a US-based technology company, suffered a ransomware attack that caused a data breach affecting 190 million US citizens.

Such examples compel regulatory bodies to further flex their muscles. Approximately 79% of countries (155 out of 194) have some form of data protection and privacy legislation in place.

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The situation demands data security measures

Solutions such as data security posture management (DSPM) enable real-time discovery and classification of sensitive data across multi-cloud and on-premises environments, reducing the risk of exposure.

AI-driven DSPM solution automates risk assessments, detect anomalous data movements, and enforce security policies dynamically, ensuring proactive protection against breaches. It also enhances threat detection, minimizes false positives, and accelerates incident response, making data security more efficient and scalable.

Mitigating potential cyber attacks

Data security solutions identify unusual data movement and exfiltration attempts early, potentially mitigating the breach’s scale. Ensuring visibility and control over structured and unstructured data, DSPM mitigates risks like shadow data exposure, misconfigurations, and excessive permissions.

In Change Healthcare’s case, a DSPM solution could have significantly reduced the impact. It could have identified excessive permissions, unsecured sensitive data, and risky access patterns across Change Healthcare’s cloud and on-premises environments.

Organizations can deploy such solutions in cloud security, data governance, compliance enforcement, and insider threat detection. Industries such as healthcare, finance, and retail use DSPM to maintain regulatory compliance (eg HIPAA, PCI-DSS, GDPR) by enforcing consistent security policies across different data repositories.

Data security is a boardroom-level concern

As cybersecurity threats grow and data security becomes a priority, CISOs are increasingly investing in solutions like DSPM. According to Gartner, about 20% of organizations will adopt DSPM technology to address growing data security and privacy challenges.

Businesses are estimated to have 55-80% dark data, which includes hidden, unmanaged, and unutilized data. Beyond security risks, shadow IT is a major contributor to IT overspending. Companies waste as much as 30-40% on redundant tools and unused licenses. Cumulatively, this represents a billion-dollar problem for the industry.

DSPM solution also addresses the challenges of shadow IT and unknown data by scanning and identifying unmonitored, duplicated, and unclassified data across environments. It provides teams with full visibility into data locations and handling practices.

Additionally, it flags unprotected assets, identifies redundant SaaS tools, and eliminates cost inefficiencies and compliance risks. By offering real-time insights into shadow data and unsanctioned applications, DSPM enables security teams to regain control, enforce policies, and prevent financial losses due to duplication and compliance failures.

DSPM does what every CISO needs

In conclusion, the DSPM solution:

Finds sensitive data automatically

Maps identity access to that data

Detects misconfigurations and exposure

Highlights risky sharing and SaaS data flows

Provides a data-centric risk view for governance, compliance, and threat reduction

T-Systems helps enterprises operationalize DSPM, not as another dashboard, but as a managed program. We deploy best-in-class DSPM platforms (CrowdStrike, Palo Alto Networks), integrate them with Identity Access Management, Security Information Event Management, Cloud Security Posture Management, and API security controls, and run continuous monitoring and risk reduction through our global Managed Security Service Provider model.

In a landscape where data is everywhere, T-Systems ensures your security is everywhere too, starting at the layer that matters most. Reduce breach likelihood and build compliance with T-Systems security solutions today.

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Need to rethink comprehensive security? Check out this guide.You can’t secure what you can’t see: the data challenge – ComputerworldRead More