Data Leak Detection

Has your data been leaked? If so you might not know. Attackers (understandably) don’t want to get caught in the act of stealing your data, so they tend not to advertise it until they’ve used that data for their own ends. How can you avoid unpleasant surprises by finding those leaks before an attack? 

How Flare Helps with Data Breach Detection

Why is data leak detection difficult for security teams? 

You often don’t know when data has been lost or leaked until much later, when leaked data has been used in attack. For this reason, monitoring your own attack surface, as well as the web is critical for your security team. However, manually scanning for leaks is an overwhelming task. It’s time-consuming, tedious, and your team runs the risk of making errors. 

How does Flare help with data leak detection? 

Flare automates the scanning process, monitoring the clear & dark web, as well as prominent threat actor communities 24/7, so your team can find data leaks immediately and take action before criminals are able to exploit any vulnerabilities. This is especially helpful in monitoring GitHub repositories for accidentally leaked secrets and other proprietary information.

Learn more about how a Fortune 100 company confidently tracks all GitHub asset relations to prevent clear web leaks with Flare.

What are the key benefits of Flare’s data leak prevention tools? 

• A proactive security stance: You might not be able to stop every single breach, but by actively seeking them out, you can catch breaches and data exposures early.
• Visibility into data leaks: Because your attack surface is constantly expanding, it can be difficult to find breaches manually. Flare’s data leak monitoring solution scans the dark and clear web, as well as prominent threat actor communities, to find leaks before an attack happens. 
• Continuous monitoring: It’s not possible for your team to scan the web manually. Using an automated solution gives you 24/7 coverage, so you will know as soon as information is leaked or stolen. 

Understanding Data Leak Detection

What is data leak detection? 

Data leaks are incidents that cause sensitive information — such as trade secrets, proprietary code, financial information or personal data — to be exposed to unauthorized individuals. Data leaks might be intentional or malicious, and it’s possible that a bad actor won’t notice or exploit accidentally leaked data, especially if that data is caught early enough. Data leak detection helps your team find leaks as soon as they happen. 

How are data leaks caused?

Leaks happen when data is accidentally leaked or deliberately stolen. This is usually the result of one of the following: 

• An external threat actor: The majority of threats to your data (83%) come from outside your company. Bad actors often attempt to steal your data by using tools like malware and ransomware as well as tactics like phishing, Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks and brute force. They may also take advantage of any vulnerabilities they find. 
• Human error: People make mistakes, and unfortunately, those mistakes can expose data. For example, a team member may accidentally push proprietary code to a public GitHub repository, or an AWS bucket may be left exposed to the web. Accidental breaches can happen internally as well; if files are left where unauthorized co-workers can read them, that is also considered a breach – even if the coworkers read the file by accident. Shadow IT is a good example of this kind of breach. 
• Malicious insiders: Insiders who deliberately expose or steal data to do harm are considered malicious. They may be disgruntled, or working for a rival company, or exposing information for financial gain. 

Can data loss be prevented? 

Yes and no. Preventing data leaks is possible with a combination of employee education, strong security controls, and a proactive cybersecurity culture, but sometimes leaks happen anyhow. Here are a few ways to prevent data leaks: 

• Require strong authentication: Best password practices are critical. Threat actors count on employees being lazy with their passwords, reusing old ones or using easy to guess passwords. 
• Encrypt code: At rest or in transit, your code should always be encrypted. If your team is distributing code across several platforms, be sure they encrypt data to keep it safe from malicious actors. 
• Harden your infrastructure: When mistakes happen, it’s best if attackers can’t see them. To mitigate harm, strengthen your infrastructure, so that threat actors can’t find vulnerabilities to exploit.
• Scan to identify leaks: It’s critical to look for leaks before they are exploited. Scan software for malicious or harmful code that may have been inserted. Search public GitHub repositories for accidentally or maliciously leaked code. Continuous scanning of sites like pastebin and monitoring the dark web can also help to quickly identify breaches and suspicious activity.

Why is Data Leak Detection Important in Today’s Cybersecurity Landscape? 

How likely is your organization’s data to be leaked? 

In 2023, there were 3,205 publicly reported data breaches, a 72% increase over 2021 which held the previous record for the highest number of publicly reported data breaches on record. However, it’s important to understand that not all breaches are reported. Some aren’t noticed, and some are simply not disclosed. 

What is the impact of a data leak? 

The average cost of a data breach peaked this year at $4.88 million. Smaller businesses tend to face higher costs from data breaches, and those costs are often passed along to the customer. However, the cost of a breach goes beyond finances; companies also lose the trust of their customers and partners, and may suffer reputational loss in general.

What’s the impact of an unreported data leak? 

Our team found that less than 10% of data breaches were reported in 2020. Many companies who don’t report data breaches are attempting to save face, but not reporting breaches does just the opposite. If a data breach goes unreported, customers and partners may be put at even more risk, because they don’t know their data has been exposed. If the breach is exposed by the media and you haven’t reported it, you are likely to face even more scrutiny, as well as legal and regulatory fines. 

Data Leak Prevention and Flare

The Flare Threat Exposure Management (TEM) solution empowers organizations to proactively detect, prioritize, and mitigate the types of exposures commonly exploited by threat actors. Our platform automatically scans the clear & dark web and prominent threat actor communities 24/7 to discover unknown events, prioritize risks, and deliver actionable intelligence you can use instantly to improve security.

Flare integrates into your security program in 30 minutes and often replaces several SaaS and open source tools. Learn more by signing up for our free trial.