Now more than ever, business is conducted via the internet. There’s an abundance of collaboration platforms, people are moving their information to secure data servers and cloud IT infrastructure, and businesses are transitioning into paperless organizations.
All of this sensitive information is being stored online, and people need a way to ensure that their data stays safe and secure. Luckily, there’s a new technology that is aimed at enhancing the security of private files and documents.
Known as Information Rights Management, this technology is designed to protect individual and organizational records throughout their lifecycles. This is different from many technologies in the sense that others typically protect documents at the source, but once they get out there, the information can be accessed, copied, and stolen.
If you want to prevent all of this, then you need the security that information rights management provides.
Prevents Unauthorized Access to Protected and Private Documents
Here’s a quick scenario: Company R provides highly relevant services to an industry. They signed on two competitors in the same market who needed their service. After establishing that there was no conflict of interest, they went ahead and sent client A their strategy and client B the projection for their project.
Unfortunately, in their hurry, they did not realize they sent the e-mail intended for client A to client B, and vice versa. This resulted in chaos for the company as they scrambled to repair the resulting damage.
However, if they had an information rights management protocol in place, they would have been able to avert the disaster. This is because Company R would have given access permission for the strategy to only client A and projections to only client B. Which means neither would have been able to obtain the encrypted documents.
The point is that IRM makes sure that the documents and the information within only gets to those who are meant to get it. Hackers, data miners, and corporate spies will not be able to access these documents unless they have the requisite permission. This is even more important given the rate of suspected government snooping on private data, as well as attacks against cloud IT infrastructures and on-site data centers.
Limits or Extends Usage Boundaries
The owners of the content can set up the system so that the rights to use is as limited or as free as they want. For instance, they can disallow the printing, taking screenshots, copying or editing of documents.
They can also determine the expiration of the document even after it has been received by the recipient. IRM covers all these and protects information even during multiple file conversions into different formats.
Document Security at All Points
Often, companies have some security for their materials at the source. There are firewalls, passwords and encryption technology. The real question is what happens when those files leave the company “vault”.
When most documents leave their source, they tend to become vulnerable and easy to intercept and snoop on. With the security of information rights management, this will be incredibly difficult to do. This is because IRM protects data at the source, in transit and after delivery to the recipient. This makes it hard for anyone to do anything with the documents even if intercepted.
There are many options out there for those in need of paperless office software with IRM technology, and my personal recommendation would be FileCenter.
