Does Consumer Grade File Sharing Belong In A Business Setting?

Google Drive, Dropbox, and OneDrive—these household tech brands are great tools for simple file sharing and collaboration. But do they belong in a business setting? The research says no. Although these free file sharing platforms serve as great tools for personal use, they can also offer risks to your organization as a whole. Here are 5 reasons to ditch consumer-grade file sharing as it can potentially harm your organization. After all, wouldn’t you rather be safe than sorry?

1. They lack close monitoring and security features

Most consumer-grade products, such as DropBox or Google Docs, are meant for collaboration and simple, easy consumer use. In short, these user platforms were built for the goal of efficiency, not security. Considering many of these platforms are free, you may find yourself in a pickle when you receive a cybersecurity threat. With limited support from larger companies, these consumer products should not be used to handle secure or sensitive documents (such as financial documents or legal information) due to a lack of data management.

In contrast, enterprise-grade file sharing tools include features that allow IT managers and administrators to monitor for rogue or abusive users. Activity logs are helpful for monitoring suspicious activity—such as a sudden increase in file activity. In many cases, these logs are used to detect ransomware attacks or data breaches so that you can stay on top of it all. There are also options, like AES encryption, that can counter breaches and abuse of any data that is lost.

In highly competitive industries, managing risk is essential for keeping a company’s intellectual property safe and revenues flowing. According to Skyhigh Networks, 92% of companies have their credentials for sale on the dark web due to rogue employees or hackers finding credentials in places such as emails or servers.

2. You lose full control of your data

Your data is not guaranteed to be your own. When you use consumer-grade solutions, your data can be hosted anywhere in the world. Accepting the risk of data loss or a breach of business-critical information is not a smart choice. Not to mention, Google Drive adjusts its terms and conditions often, meaning any privacy adjustments will most likely go unnoticed. It took weeks for a user to find this little term back in 2012.

“Some of our Services allow you to submit content. You retain ownership of any intellectual property rights that you hold in that content. In short, what belongs to you stays yours.

When you upload or otherwise submit content to our Services, you give Google (and those we work with) a worldwide license to use, host, store, reproduce, modify, create derivative works (such as those resulting from translations, adaptations or other changes we make so that your content works better with our Services), communicate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute such content.”

Once the word got out, users started complaining, and Google responded by modifying the terms to subdue the consumer backlash.

3. They are not made for compliance

Healthcare providers, hospital contractors, and financial organizations are familiar with the standards set forth to protect Personal Health Information (PHI) or identification information.

Anyone who contracts or interacts with PHI must be HIPAA compliant in their file sharing and servers. In short, HIPAA compliance requires security features and transparency for IT administrators. For more information on what exactly is required for HIPAA compliance, read more here.

4. They are not built for administration or visibility

One of the root causes of weak compliance is the lack of visibility and administration. An enterprise organization must invest in quality IT staff who can exercise their best judgment and expertise.

Consumer-grade products offer base-level transparency with simple permissions, such as viewing who edits a document; but enterprise-grade products expand on these features.

Granular user permissions ensure that the right people have access to their corresponding documents. Not only can a file owner control how long a client can access information on a URL, but a Systems Administrator can ensure everyone in the company (even the CEO) only has access to the information necessary to complete their work. This lessens the effectiveness of some ransomware strains that “feed” on accessible information.

5. They run the risk of getting hacked

In 2012, Dropbox was victimized by a phishing scam that took internal information that allowed access to several Dropbox accounts. After finding the source of the issue, Dropbox had to develop more safety features to mitigate the damage.

This reactive approach shows that consumer-grade products aren’t concerned with the latest viruses or security. Their focus is on user-friendliness and convenience within the consumer experience. This is not surprising and, in fact, makes sense as Dropbox sources revenue from happy customers who seek simple storage solutions—like storing masses of photos or basic documents. On the flip side, business-grade platforms will be more concerned with cybersecurity inherently because of the type of information stored in the platforms.

Conclusion

In today’s digital-first landscape, data is seen as the new gold. The Internet is filled with articles stating the importance of data, how much can be achieved by analyzing data, and how data-driven insights can be a major resource for business growth. However, when data turns into a valuable commodity, sought after by many, it also attracts the attention of threat actors. Data is, after all, what threat actors can steal from digital ecosystems.

To ensure the protection of data across distributed and complex systems, backup and recovery strategies should be created. At the moment, IoT deployments continue to increase, but not many businesses and end users are taking the necessary steps to secure data in these environments. This can create issues in the future, as smart homes’, offices’, and cities’ connectivity increases, and data becomes more exposed to highly exploitable ecosystems.

6. Limited Support

Consumer-grade file sharing solutions typically offer limited support, relying mostly on users or administrators to submit support tickets through email or online forms.

This can pose a challenge for companies that depend on these solutions to manage their daily operations, as they may not have immediate access to their data if an issue arises. The resolution time for these issues can vary, and may be impacted by the service level of the consumer-grade file sharing solution.

7. Loss of Accountability

Limited accountability is a risk with consumer-grade file sharing solutions. With a lack of proper audit logs, separate user and administrator accounts, granular user permissions and 2-Factor Authentication (2FA), it is difficult for companies to hold users accountable for data leakages and data losses. This means that if a malicious user gains access to the consumer-grade file sharing solution through a shared user account or hacking, they can potentially share, leak, delete, or alter sensitive and confidential information without leaving a traceable trail.

8. Limited Control Becomes a Burden on Management

Limited control over data is a major concern with consumer-grade file sharing solution. If data leakage or loss occurs, the management of the company will face the added burden of identifying the root cause and incurring additional costs for prevention or data recovery. This limitation of the company’s control over its own data can lead to more time and money being spent on resolving these issues.

9. Scattered Data

Some companies may have a habit of storing their data on multiple consumer-grade file sharing solutions, leading to the IT team having to waste time and effort to perform security checks across different consumer-grade file sharing solutions. By storing data on multiple consumer-grade file sharing solutions, this results in data being scattered and users wasting time searching for it than actually doing work and being productive.

10. Data Theft & the WFH Trend

With the widespread trend of working from home, companies face challenges in maintaining control over the storage and sharing of its company data. Consumer-grade file sharing solutions often lack a proper approval process and audit logs, putting sensitive company data at risk of being stored on unauthorised devices and unauthorized sharing from those devices. This increases the likelihood of data theft and data leakages and this undermines the security of sensitive and confidential company data.

Conclusion

In the current digital era, data is considered a valuable asset and essential for driving business growth and success. With the abundance of data being generated and stored, it becomes a prime target for cyber-attacks and data breaches. To secure this valuable asset, enterprise-grade file sharing solutions must be adopted and in place.

Credits: John Hurley (author)