Data Loss Prevention in Financial Services

When it comes to DLP, security leaders have hundreds – if not thousands – of networks and endpoints to monitor and lock down. And, while devices and file sharing applications are on everyone’s radar, when asked what threat vector they’re most concerned about protecting, security leaders said email. 

It makes sense. 

Over 306.4 billion emails were sent and received in 2020 and employees spend 40% of their time on email. Accidents happen.

A simple mistake can cause big problems, especially with strict data privacy laws like GLBA, COPPA, and FDIC 370. 

Unfortunately, accidents like this happen a lot more frequently than security leaders estimate.

So, why do employees make mistakes at work that compromise security? According to employees, the top three reasons are: stress, fatigue, and distraction.

And, while many firms are slowly transitioning back to the office, others are adopting permanent remote and hybrid working environments, with 69% FS companies saying they’ll have over half of their workforce working remotely at least once a week going forward. 

The problem is, over half (44%) of security leaders in financial services say they’re concerned about employees’ unsafe data security practices in a hybrid-remote environment. And they have every right to be concerned. 

56% of employees working in financial services say they’re less likely to follow safe data practices when working remotely. 

Our research shows that, across industries, security leaders are most worried about losing customers and their trust and lost data in the aftermath of a breach.

But, if you break that data down even further and isolate security leaders working in financial services specifically, you can see a stark difference. Instead of losing customer trust and lost data, they’re twice as likely to say that their top concern is damaged reputation. 

Why? Because reputation is everything in financial services and, the only way to retain clients and win new business is by demonstrating you have a strong information security framework.

Financial institutions like Prudential, Schroders, Investec, and GoCardless trust Tessian to keep their critical client and employee data safe. Across two solutions, Tessian automatically detects and prevents misdirected emails, mistattached files, and unauthorized emails and puts data at security leaders’ fingertips.  No rules required. 

Better still, Tessian helps improve employees’ security reflexes long-term with in-the-moment warnings that reinforce security policies while nudging them towards safer behavior over time. And, with employee risk scores that update automatically, security leaders get a bird’s eye view of their most risky and at-risk employees.

It’s the only solution that offers protection, training, and risk analytics all in one platform, giving security leaders a clear picture of their organization’s risk and the tools needed to reduce that risk.