The IBM-SLA data breach shows a simple but important problem in enterprise cybersecurity: sensitive data can be exposed even when it is being used outside the main production system.
The breach involved unauthorised access to a dataset created for vendor development and testing. That dataset was meant to contain mock or anonymised data, but was later found to include real personal information, including names, NRIC numbers and past property addresses. Around 70,000 people were affected.
Businesses often copy data into testing, development, vendor and cloud environments. These environments are necessary for operations, but they can also create risk when real information is used in the wrong place. If that data is readable, a breach of a secondary environment can become a breach of personal information.
Most organisations already use standard cybersecurity tools to protect systems. These include access controls, firewalls, monitoring, authentication and encryption for stored data or data moving between systems. These controls are useful, but they do not fully protect data while it is being used. In many systems, sensitive information must be decrypted before an application, employee or process can work with it.
Once data is decrypted, anyone with the wrong level of access, or anyone who compromises the right system, may be able to see it.
Encryption in use is designed to close that gap. It keeps sensitive data encrypted by default and only reveals what is needed, when it is needed, and to an authorised user or process. System access should not automatically mean data access.
Vaultrex is built around that approach. Instead of relying only on protection around the database, application or cloud environment, it protects the data itself. Its model uses controlled, just-in-time decryption, so only the required data element is revealed for an approved task. Once that task is complete, the information is automatically re-encrypted.
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