Also known as: DLP · data leak prevention
Data loss prevention (DLP) refers to tools and policies that detect and block sensitive information from leaving an organisation through channels such as email, cloud uploads, or removable media.
DLP works by classifying data — through pattern matching, fingerprinting, or labelling — and enforcing policy at egress points. It is most effective against accidental disclosure and casual insider misuse.
Against a determined attacker it is considerably weaker, since encrypting or encoding data before exfiltration defeats content inspection. DLP is best understood as reducing accidental leakage and raising the effort required for deliberate theft, not as a hard boundary.
Data Exfiltration
Data exfiltration is the unauthorised transfer of data out of an organisation's environment by an attacker, typically the final objective of an intrusion.
Encryption at Rest
Encryption at rest is the encryption of stored data — on disks, in databases, or in backups — so that physical access to the storage medium does not yield readable data.
Insider Threat
An insider threat is a security risk originating from someone with legitimate authorised access to an organisation's systems, whether acting maliciously, negligently, or through a compromised account.
Zero Trust
Zero trust is a security architecture that removes implicit trust based on network location, requiring every request to be authenticated, authorised, and continuously validated regardless of whether it originates inside or outside the corporate network.