Recently, a data breach involving personal information of users of one of the most popular tools in the world—Google Drive—was revealed.
Sure, Google took some big steps to address the problem by letting users disable Google Docs and backing up all data in Drive on a regular basis. These two changes are pretty minor, but they are improvements. It’s good to see Google getting ahead of the issue, but there are three things they can do right now that would go a long way in making this kind of incident less likely to happen in the future.
Here’s what you need to do to keep your data in Google Drive safe.
1. Setting up your Google Drive
Step 1: Signing up Before you can get your hands on any company data, you need to create an account with Google Workspace. Signing up is quick and easy. Step 2: Creating a repository. This is how you will access Google Drive. So many companies use a pre-existing source such as Box or Dropbox. However, you can set up Google Drive as a separate folder. I prefer to do this. It’s less work and you have greater control. Step 3: Creating documents. Once you create a repository you can start using the software as normal. But to do that you need to “create” a document. To do that, click on “Create new document.” Step 4: Adding content to your document. You can do pretty much anything you’d normally do in a word processor. But you will be limited by what you can “type into” your Google Doc.
2. Creating a Sharing Policy
Whether you’re a new or existing customer, if you’re going to share documents outside of your company or organization, it’s a good idea to create a policy on how that information can be shared and by whom. The document you’re working on can be made private, for example. This is particularly useful if you’re working with a large, international client or colleague who needs access to documents that will only be seen by the other party. Your administrator can even choose to disable file sharing entirely for entire organization or certain sub-orgs in a matter of clicks.
3. Safeguarding Data in Google Drive
Google Drive has always been a great place to share files with people outside of your company. It provides the advantage of digital storage that doesn’t require the time and effort of copying and pasting from different computers and servers. It’s also where you’ll find your key documents that you need to access at any given time. However, as data is shared around the world, it becomes easier for people to see it. These files can be shared around your company as well and can leak your data. How easy is the information to get? There’s a simple way to know. Every month or so, Google emails a security alert to all the users of Google Drive that contains information regarding the safety of the accounts. As a company owner, you can use this information to monitor your Google Drive accounts.
Partnered with Google
Netkiller has been a Google Partner since 2008, and specialises in helping Google Workspace users protect and save their Google Drive data with the Netkiller ISMS Data Loss Prevention Platform and Google Drive Security Scan service. Contact for information on how to best secure your Google Workspace from data leaks.