Cybersecurity Glossary
Data Loss Prevention
Rules that spot sensitive information leaving the organisation and either warn, block or record it.
What Data Loss Prevention means
The system looks for patterns such as card numbers, national identifiers or documents carrying a confidential label, and applies a rule when they appear in an outgoing message or an upload. Started in blocking mode it produces angry users. Started in warning mode it produces a map of what actually happens.
Why Data Loss Prevention matters for small businesses and nonprofits
Most leaks in small organisations are accidental, the wrong recipient in an autocomplete or a spreadsheet uploaded to a personal drive. A short warning at the moment of sending prevents far more incidents than a policy document.
What to do about Data Loss Prevention
- Run in warning mode first, for at least a month, and read the results before blocking anything
- Start with two or three data types that would genuinely hurt you, not a long list
- Explain the warnings to the team in advance, so they read them instead of clicking through
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Rules that spot sensitive information leaving the organisation and either warn, block or record it.