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It never ceases to amaze me how the weakness of a secure system is always the people. It's common to see companies invest in "encrypted databases" and "on premi

It never ceases to amaze me how the weakness of a secure system is always the people. It's common to see companies invest in "encrypted databases" and "on premises data storage" in the name of security while not spending the time and money to ensure the users can only see the information they need to see. Nobody should ever be able to just download the entire table like that. Typically in this use case, you'd think the system would be set up such that users can only query full individual records if they work on the case itself OR limited (retracted) records for the entire population. That's how we handle our customer database. If you work as a customer service agent, you can pull the entire record of a single customer but not more than 1 at a time and rate limited. For out data analytics team, you have access to all the records without the personal information (users are given a random unique userID. no names, addresses, emails, or phone numbers). The rationale is simple, we don't want anyone to be able to simply download our customer database and spam them. In this case, the consequences are much worse for the people affected.

est31 8y ago
> Nobody should ever be able to just download the entire table like that. Easily said, but even the NSA couldn't protect from an insider obtaining tons of internal documents. Nor could google prevent the theft of LIDAR sensor trade secrets.
- oliwarner 8y ago
  Didn't not Couldn't. These access issues [commonly] aren't bugs, they're laziness. Shared volumes to speed up collaboration, no granular permissions, or relying on threat of access audit to keep people in line. In most of these networks, mechanisms exist that could have limited access to those that need it. And part of that is the technological culture of how we've been taught to share files. We still commonly rely on third parties to handle big transfers.
- brazzledazzle 8y ago
  Often it’s a conscious tradeoff between convenience and security. Google can afford the best off the shelf data loss prevention tools as well as the budget to develop their own. The problem with having your code/assets locked up like Fort Knox is that it becomes a nightmare for your employees. Even if you just have passive systems that prompt investigations about questionable usage people tend to bristle at being spied on, particularly if you remind them of that fact.

est31 8y ago

> Nobody should ever be able to just download the entire table like that. Easily said, but even the NSA couldn't protect from an insider obtaining tons of internal documents. Nor could google prevent the theft of LIDAR sensor trade secrets.

oliwarner 8y ago
Didn't not Couldn't. These access issues [commonly] aren't bugs, they're laziness. Shared volumes to speed up collaboration, no granular permissions, or relying on threat of access audit to keep people in line. In most of these networks, mechanisms exist that could have limited access to those that need it. And part of that is the technological culture of how we've been taught to share files. We still commonly rely on third parties to handle big transfers.
brazzledazzle 8y ago
Often it’s a conscious tradeoff between convenience and security. Google can afford the best off the shelf data loss prevention tools as well as the budget to develop their own. The problem with having your code/assets locked up like Fort Knox is that it becomes a nightmare for your employees. Even if you just have passive systems that prompt investigations about questionable usage people tend to bristle at being spied on, particularly if you remind them of that fact.