Folder Encryption Supports Financial Compliance

Encrypted Folders in MFT Can Help Meet Financial Industry Compliance Requirements

Organizations in the financial sector that need to meet compliance requirements for PCI DSS, GLBA, or SOX can benefit from folder encryption functionality in their Managed File Transfer (MFT) solution. Utilizing folder encryption can help meet the mandate to encrypt sensitive data both in transit and at rest (or not “in the clear” on disk).  Encrypting can help guard against cyberthreats and accidental misuse, an especially crucial step for the financial industry.

Encrypted folder functionality helps financial organizations avoid hefty fines or reputation-ruining sanctions for not properly encrypting data.

Financial Data Breaches Take Hefty Toll

Verizon’s annual Data Breach Investigations Report for 2023 clearly shows that the vast majority of data breaches across all industries involved an outside threat (83%), with human elements or errors playing a starring role in 74% of breaches. Encrypting financial or other sensitive data can be a key proactive step in diminishing those statistics, which for the financial sector cost a whopping $5.90 million on average, according to IBM’s 2023 Cost of a Data Breach Report.

Benefits of Encrypting Folders Containing Financial Data

“It goes without saying that data that’s unencrypted at rest and in transit is more easily subject to malware threats and exploitation – whether those threats are intentional or stem from accidental actions by employees,” noted Chris Spargen, Senior Manager, Solutions Engineering, Fortra. “MFT solutions that offer automated encryption options, such as encrypted folders, can help mitigate this risk without the need for repetitive, manual intervention when it comes to applying encryption to the folders.”

Financial organizations using a robust MFT solution with the ability to encrypt folders for data storage can foster more secure, streamlined collaboration with trading partners and customers by:

• Granting granular permissions for access to authorized folders and files
• Automatically decrypting files for authorized users
• Setting up event triggers to automate file processing
• Ensuring all file transfer activity is auditable to help satisfy regulatory requirements

Related Reading: 5 Ways MFT Helps the Financial Industry

GoAnywhere MFT’s Folder Encryption Feature Uses AES-256 for Strong Protection

Fortra’s GoAnywhere MFT protects folders at rest (or on disk) with the AES-256 encryption algorithm, when the Encrypted Folders option is enabled, to add a strong layer of protection around critical financial data. AES-256 symmetric encryption offers one of the most unbreakable encryption ciphers available.

Spargen added, "We hear customers commonly wanting to protect data at rest. With Encrypted Folders enabled, they find it easy to define the folders that need this protection, set it, and forget it. The automated process of encrypting data written to disk and decrypting that data as it leaves GoAnywhere makes it easy on administrators and provides peace of mind they are protected from third-party access to sensitive data." This streamlines and ensures that the PCI DSS compliance standard for data security to never have data stored in the clear on disk at any time is upheld.

Encrypted Folder Benefits Can Be Used Across File Transfer Activities

Users can apply encrypted folder functionality to their automated workflows, to event triggers, as well as to servers including AS2, FTP, FTPS, HTTPS, SFTP to apply this layer of protection across a wide range of file transfer activities, further boosting the impact of automation for data protection at rest and in transit. Encrypted Folders make it easy for financial organizations to cover all inbound and outbound data transmissions, as the data is written to file systems. This helps ensure that encryption is applied for all sensitive financial data that passes through GoAnywhere, each step of the way.