Companies today handle a large amount of sensitive data such as customer information including financial records, as well as intellectual property. It is imperative to secure this information against unauthorized access so customers can continue to trust the business with their data, and to ensure that the information is legally accessible in the case of a dispute or regulatory action.
Unauthorized access to sensitive data can have severe consequences for a business, including losses in sales, reputational damage and legal costs. Adopting a security strategy which outlines the steps to safeguard sensitive information will help reduce the likelihood of cyber attacks and safeguard itself from legal risks.
Information protection is the broad range of software that can help businesses safeguard sensitive information regardless of whether it’s in the cloud or on devices such as laptops. Information protection encompasses everything from policies that determine the type of information that is considered sensitive and how it’s used to access it, to physical controls, such as password protection or encryption as well as processes that monitor access, detect threats, and take action to the threat.
The Microsoft Information Protection (MIP) suite of services, also referred to as Azure Information Protection or Purview, enables the detection and classification of sensitive information according to its sensitivity level by using labeling. This enables you to protect the information no matter where it lives or travels, and to monitor who has accessed it, and to revoke their access when necessary. It’s also possible for you to extend MIP into other applications and systems via the SDK which means that line-of-business applications can apply sensitive labels to documents as they export them, or design tools for CAD/CAM can use MIP to automatically encode files is mcm client spyware before they are saved to a folder.