Balancing data sharing and compliance can feel like a conflict. Involving business users in your data flow can make you nervous, especially since 88% of data breaches happen because of employee mistakes. But to make things work better, you need to let more people in. Currently, only 13% of business users can make the most of new data quickly.
So, how do you find the balance between sharing data and following the rules? How do you ensure secure data sharing? How can you share your data without worrying about what could go wrong? Read on to find out.
What is Data Sharing?
Data sharing requires letting one or many users access the same data. In today's business world, data is a crucial asset. Secure data sharing, whether inside or outside your organization, opens doors to new opportunities—collaboration with partners, forming alliances, and making money through data.
More than 97% of executives today invest in data, analytics, and AI, realizing the risks of not doing so. In the sea of data, safeguarding sensitive information is crucial.
As people become more aware of personal data use and regulations are tightened, the link between data sharing and security is clear. If strict security measures are not taken, this can lead to significant financial losses and damage trust.
Recent examples (like Meta's $1.3 billion fine for moving EU data and GoodRX's $1.5 million penalty for sharing health info without consent) highlight the costs of poor data practices. Avoiding such situations not only prevents losses but also ensures that companies remain competitive and enjoy a good reputation with regulators and customers.
Types of Data Sharing
Old-School Sharing Tech
There are technical solutions such as SFTP or cloud storage. SFTP has to contend with many users, and cloud storage has limits tied to a specific provider.
Commercial Solutions
There are solutions in products like Oracle or AWS Redshift. They're practical but only share tables and don't work well with other platforms.
Modern Open-Source Fix
Open-source solutions are free from restrictions and offer advantages such as integration into the community and simple connections with commercial tools.
Meet Delta Sharing
Delta Sharing is the first open protocol for secure data sharing, simplifying collaboration across different platforms:
- Direct Data Sharing: Share live data without extra steps;
- Flexible Connections: Users can connect directly, reducing hassle;
- Secure Governance: Easily track and audit who accesses your data.
- Scalability: Share large datasets efficiently via cloud storage.
Delta Sharing on Databricks
Databricks works seamlessly with Delta Sharing, making sharing and managing data within and between organizations simple. Admins can easily manage shares, and users can access data from any platform on any cloud.
Standards for Secure Data Sharing Across Organizations
Data migration involve moving data from one place to another. Companies do this to upgrade systems, merge data, or switch to the cloud. It is important to ensure that everything runs smoothly, but it can also pose risks to data security and protection if not done carefully.
Why GDPR Matters?
The GDPR is a set of EU regulations designed to protect people's personal data. If a company, no matter where it is based, fails to comply with these rules, it can face heavy fines, reputational damage, and even legal problems.
Challenges in Data Migration and Following GDPR
Moving data, if not done properly, can lead to data breaches or someone gaining access to personal information. Here are some challenges:
Figuring out which personal data is involved in the move can be difficult, especially in large organizations where data is scattered everywhere.
To comply with the GDPR, it is important that the data subjects give their consent for their data to be transferred to the new location and used there.
The GDPR states that you should only collect and store the data that you really need. During the move, it's essential to focus on what's necessary and get rid of the rest.
Use strong security measures to protect data during migration to prevent unauthorized access.
Following Data Protection Laws During Migration
To make sure everything is done right, companies can:
Look at all the personal data, find out what it is, and understand the risks.
Look at what could go wrong for people during the move and make sure these problems don't occur.
Inform people about the move, explain why it's happening, and get their explicit consent to keep things open.
- Data Anonymization and Pseudonymization
Think about hiding or changing personal data during the move to make it more secure.
Use strong codes to keep data safe during the move, whether it's going from one place to another or standing still.
If another company is helping with the move, make sure they follow the rules and sign a data handling agreement.
5 Best Practices for Secure Data Sharing
1. Incorporate Strong Security Measures into Tech Systems
Traditional security methods like perimeter defenses and fixed access controls are no longer sufficient to protect cloud data. That's why you should build security measures directly into your technical foundation. This ensures proactive protection of data, no matter its location or state.
Using a dedicated data security platform that enforces controls across all platforms and users, whether inside or outside the organization, is crucial to your data setup.
2. Discover and Classify Your Data
As data grows and cloud systems become more complex, teams need tools to identify and classify sensitive information. Automated data discovery tools give you a clear picture of the data in your system and make it easier to tag and categorize it. This automated process speeds things up and avoids delays caused by manual checks.
If you know the sensitive data in your system, you can identify and fix potential problems early on. This is a key step in setting up rules and access controls for secure data sharing.
3. Set Up Flexible Data Access Controls
Since data sharing is a big part of doing business, you need dynamic access controls that are detailed and scalable. This is especially important with setups like data mesh, where data owners create their own controls.
Use attribute-based access control (ABAC) for more flexibility and efficiency. It requires far fewer rules than role-based access control (RBAC). By basing access on various factors, like data details and user information, ABAC ensures users only access data when needed. This simplifies the secure data sharing and ensures you stick to the rules.
4. Keep an Eye on Data and Check Regularly
Relying only on data discovery and access controls isn't enough. To avoid problems and stay compliant, you must actively monitor and regularly review your data.
Continuous monitoring helps find and fix problems in real-time, preventing problems from spreading. Regular checks ensure that your data security complies with the rules. This allows you to prove that you follow both internal and external regulations. Monitoring and controls together strengthen your data security and keep your data sharing safe.
5. Work Together Across Teams
Making data sharing safe is a team effort. The data platform, security, and governance teams all have a role in ensuring data sharing works well for everyone.
Together, these teams set up smooth processes, find potential problems, and ensure data security meets the company's objectives.
- Data platform teams share data needs and set up controls.
- Data security teams monitor data safety and create plans to fix problems.
- Data governance teams make sure rules match up with the law and run audits to show compliance.