Why employees need to encrypt files on their company USB flash Drives

If companies aren’t using file-encrypted USB flash drives, company owners should rethink their security policies. Did you know that a recent poll found Londoners lost roughly 4,500 drives a year, leaving them in taxi cabs, libraries, offices, etc. Without encryption, anyone can view your files on a flash drive, regardless of which city you are in.

Why if an employee loses their USB drive, it isn’t just the files on the drive that might threaten a company’s reputation, etc. Do you know the true cost of lost data? If a USB flash drive goes missing it can have widespread effects.

• Lost productivity and creativity affects an organisation’s cost.
• Additional fines for not abiding by UK data privacy laws.
• The cost of the data breach alone.
• The loss of intellectual property that belongs to the company
• The cost of having an IT team doing a forensic investigation
• The cost of the time of doing a study. 

Due to EU privacy laws UK businesses are required to implement data usage Policies

Companies should train their employees to keep their flash drives encrypted. This keeps files safe in case a USB flash drive is lost. This allows companies to keep their most sensitive files safe from hackers. As long as employees know what the company policy is and how it affects data regulations, this can companies to stay complete with EU data regulations. People may think that having encrypted drives may mean the loss of convenience; however, by encrypting drives, this keeps company files safe and still allows the convenience of allowing employees share information with clients and within the company.

By using port management software, this ensures only encrypted flash drives are used in company machines. This may also ensure that companies avoid the fines of more than £1,000 per an incident in a security breach. Why are encrypted files safe? Unless a hacker has a deception key or original credentials, it can be difficult to reconstitute encrypted data.  Many businesses may take data encryption too lightly, thinking a hacker cannot steal data off a hard drive or external hard drive. Without heighten security measures, companies can may find hackers too glad to take their trade secrets and sensitive information.

Have you ever had to consult a data recovery specialist because you lost data? Isn’t it nice to know a specialist can retrieve your data? Isn’t nice to know data may not be lost if a hacker steals data. We recover data from Raid systems, laptop hard drives, external hard drives, USB flash drives and more.