DLP - Data Loss Prevention

Data loss prevention (DLP) is a technology and business process designed to detect and prevent violations to corporate policies regarding the use, storage and transmission of sensitive data.

Due to increasing insider threats and more demanding state privacy laws (many of which have stern data protection or access components), adoption of DLP is growing. It's a strategy to ensure that end users don’t send sensitive or critical information outside the corporate network. It's also used to describe software products that help a network administrator control what data end users can transfer.

Software products of this type use business rules to organize and shield confidential and critical data. If an employee tried to upload a corporate file to a consumer cloud storage service, for example, the employee would be denied permission. Some of these types of tools can also be used to filter data streams on the corporate network and protect data in motion, as well as monitor and control endpoint activities.