Your DSPM Found the Data. Now What? The Missing Link in Enterprise Data Protection

The Uncomfortable Truth About Data Security Posture Management

Every security team faces the same dilemma. Your Data Security Posture Management platform has catalogued every sensitive file across your organization. You know exactly where customer data lives, which databases contain intellectual property, and who has access to financial records. The dashboards look impressive in board meetings.

But here’s what keeps CISOs awake at night: knowing where private data exists doesn’t prevent it from walking out the door. DSPM tools excel at discovery and labeling, yet they’re powerless when someone downloads that confidential merger document, emails it to a personal account, or collaborates on it using unsecured cloud storage.

The gap between visibility and control is where most data breaches happen. Organizations invest heavily in discovering their data landscape, only to watch private information slip away through everyday business activities like file sharing, external collaboration, and remote work.

What Happens After DSPM Labeling

When DSPM platforms scan your environment, they create detailed inventories of private assets. Financial spreadsheets get tagged as “Confidential,” customer databases receive “Restricted” labels, and intellectual property files are marked “Internal Only.” These labels paint a clear picture of your data risk landscape.

However, these labels are just metadata. They can’t enforce themselves. A spreadsheet marked “Confidential” can still be downloaded to a personal laptop, printed on an unsecured printer, or uploaded to consumer cloud storage. The label provides visibility but offers no protection during the activities that matter most—when data moves and gets used.

This limitation becomes especially problematic during external collaboration. Modern business requires sharing private information with partners, vendors, customers, and contractors. DSPM can identify which files shouldn’t be shared externally, but it can’t prevent someone from emailing them anyway or control how they’re used once shared.

Real-World Impact of the DSPM Protection Gap

Consider a typical scenario: your legal team needs to collaborate with external counsel on a merger agreement containing highly private financial data. DSPM has properly labeled this document as “Restricted” and flagged that only specific executives should have access. But business reality demands that outside lawyers review, edit, and comment on the document.

Traditional approaches create impossible choices. Email the document and lose all control over how it’s used. Require external parties to visit your office for in-person collaboration and kill productivity. Use consumer file-sharing services and violate your own security policies. None of these options satisfy both security and business requirements.

This dilemma repeats across every industry. Manufacturers need suppliers to review proprietary designs. Healthcare organizations must share patient data with specialists. Financial institutions collaborate with auditors on private reports. In each case, DSPM provides the labeling foundation, but organizations lack the technology to maintain control during actual usage.

Organizations face an impossible choice: violate their security policies by using insecure sharing methods, or compromise business operations by restricting access to private information that external parties legitimately need. This gap between visibility and control creates the conditions where data breaches occur, not from sophisticated attacks, but from everyday business necessities.

How Enterprise Data Protection Should Work

The solution requires connecting DSPM’s discovery capabilities with policy-driven enforcement technology. Instead of hoping people follow security guidelines, organizations need systems that automatically enforce tag-based rules when users choose to share private data through secure channels.

This means creating secure environments where private data can be accessed, edited, and shared without ever leaving organizational control. When someone shares a file through a secure platform, the system should automatically apply appropriate restrictions based on the recipient’s role, device security posture, and business context.

Effective data protection also requires granular control over specific actions. View-only access for some users, editing rights for others, and complete restrictions on downloading, printing, or screen capture depending on the data labeling and business requirements. These controls must work seamlessly across all file types and applications without disrupting legitimate business activities.

Kiteworks Private Data Network Approach

Kiteworks addresses this challenge through its Private Data Network, which creates a secure platform for routing private content communications. Rather than sending files directly between users, organizations can route email attachments, file transfers, and collaborative editing through the PDN’s secure architecture when sharing private information.

The system integrates directly with existing DSPM platforms from vendors like Palo Alto Networks, Wiz, and Fortra. When users upload content that DSPM has tagged as “Confidential” to PDN, the platform automatically inherits that labeling and applies corresponding security policies. This creates a bridge between data discovery and protection when organizations choose to use secure sharing channels.

PDN operates on the principle that context should drive security decisions when users choose to share through the platform. A file’s DSPM labeling, the recipient’s role, their device security status, network location, and business relationship all influence what actions they’re permitted to take. Someone accessing confidential financial data from a managed device on the corporate network might receive full editing privileges, while the same person using a personal device from home gets view-only access.

The system maintains complete audit trails of every interaction. When regulators ask who accessed specific patient records or auditors need to verify intellectual property handling, organizations have forensic-level logs showing exactly what happened throughout each document’s lifecycle.

Next-Generation DRM: Solving the Legacy Problem

Traditional Digital Rights Management solutions promise to protect documents after they leave organizational control, but they consistently fail in practice. Legacy DRM requires software installation, breaks with application updates, works only with specific file formats, and creates such poor user experiences that people actively circumvent the controls.

SafeEDIT takes a fundamentally different approach. Instead of encrypting files and hoping recipient devices properly enforce restrictions, SafeEDIT keeps private documents on secure servers and streams interactive video feeds to users’ browsers. The original file never leaves the protected environment, yet users can view, edit, and collaborate as if the application were running locally.

This technology works with any application that has a graphical interface. Microsoft Office documents, AutoCAD drawings, Adobe PDFs, custom business applications, and specialized industry software can all be shared securely through SafeEDIT. Since the system operates at the user interface level rather than the file format level, it doesn’t require custom integrations or format-specific protection mechanisms.

The user experience is indistinguishable from local editing. SafeEDIT streams at 60 frames per second with sub-100 millisecond latency, making remote editing feel native. Users click, type, and navigate exactly as they would with locally installed software, but the underlying document remains secure in the PDN environment.

Real-World Applications Across Industries

Financial services organizations use this approach to enable secure collaboration with external auditors and legal counsel. Instead of sending private financial statements and regulatory reports, banks share them through SafeEDIT with time-limited access and role-based editing permissions. External parties can review, annotate, and suggest changes without ever downloading the underlying documents.

Manufacturing companies protect intellectual property during supplier collaboration. Proprietary CAD drawings and technical specifications are shared through SafeEDIT with print restrictions and screenshot prevention. Suppliers can view detailed technical information and add annotations for manufacturing feedback while the original designs remain secure.

Healthcare organizations maintain HIPAA compliance during multi-provider consultations. Specialists can review patient records, medical imaging, and treatment plans through SafeEDIT with audit trails showing exactly who accessed what information and when. The technology enables collaborative care while maintaining complete data protection.

Government contractors collaborate on private documents with multiple security authorization levels. Different team members receive access appropriate to their authorization level, with the system automatically redacting sections based on sensitivity markings. All interactions are logged for security reviews and compliance auditing.

Bridging the DSPM Gap: A Complete Workflow

The integration between DSPM discovery and PDN protection creates a comprehensive security workflow when organizations adopt secure sharing practices. DSPM platforms continuously scan repositories and apply labels based on content analysis, regulatory requirements, and business policies. These labels flow into PDN when users choose to share content through the secure platform, where they drive access control decisions and usage restrictions.

When someone uploads a labeled file to PDN for sharing, the platform evaluates the appropriate security controls. Internal recipients with proper authorization might receive full access, while external parties get time-limited view-only permissions with watermarking and download restrictions. The system applies these controls automatically based on the file’s DSPM labeling and the recipient’s profile.

During collaborative editing, SafeEDIT enforces real-time restrictions. Copy and paste operations are controlled, allowing content movement within the document while blocking transfers to external applications. Screen recording and screenshot capabilities are disabled, preventing unauthorized capture of private information. Session timeouts ensure access doesn’t persist beyond business requirements.

All interactions feed back into the DSPM analytics engine, creating a continuous improvement loop. Usage patterns help refine labeling accuracy, policy violations inform security training needs, and collaboration analytics guide business process optimization. The result is an evolving data protection strategy that adapts to changing business requirements while maintaining security standards.

Measuring Protection Effectiveness

Organizations implementing this integrated approach typically track several key performance indicators to measure success. Data leakage incidents provide the most direct security metric, comparing unauthorized file sharing events before and after implementation. Most organizations see dramatic reductions in uncontrolled external file sharing once secure alternatives become available.

Policy compliance rates offer another important measure. Organizations can track how often users follow secure sharing procedures versus reverting to insecure methods like email attachments or consumer cloud storage. High compliance rates indicate that the secure alternatives are sufficiently convenient for daily business use.

Business impact metrics help justify the investment in enhanced data protection. Time to complete external collaborations, partner satisfaction with sharing processes, and productivity measures for remote teams all indicate whether security improvements come at the cost of business efficiency.

Technical performance metrics ensure the infrastructure supports business requirements. System availability, session response times, and user experience scores validate that the technology meets performance expectations while delivering security benefits.

Common Questions About Moving Beyond DSPM

Organizations considering this approach frequently ask about integration complexity with existing DSPM investments. The PDN architecture is designed to complement rather than replace existing data discovery platforms. Tags and metadata flow seamlessly from DSPM systems into PDN access controls without requiring migration or duplicate configuration efforts.

Performance concerns often arise around browser-based editing compared to local applications. Real-world implementations demonstrate that users typically cannot distinguish between SafeEDIT sessions and local editing once they experience the system directly. The streaming technology delivers native performance without the security compromises of traditional file sharing.

Compliance teams want to understand how the approach affects regulatory reporting and audit requirements. The comprehensive logging provided by PDN actually simplifies compliance activities by providing detailed records of who accessed what information when and what actions they performed. This granular audit trail often exceeds regulatory requirements and reduces the effort required for compliance reporting.

Business leaders frequently question whether external partners will accept browser-based collaboration instead of receiving file copies. In practice, most external parties prefer the secure approach once they understand the benefits. They can collaborate immediately without software installation, access is automatically managed, and they’re protected from liability associated with securing private documents on their own systems.

Business Case for Complete Data Protection

The cost of data breaches continues to escalate, with recent studies showing average enterprise breach costs exceeding $4.88 million. Regulatory fines add additional financial risk, ranging from hundreds of thousands to tens of millions of dollars depending on the jurisdiction and data types involved. These reactive costs far exceed the investment required for proactive data protection.

Beyond direct financial impact, data breaches damage customer trust, competitive positioning, and business relationships. Organizations that suffer intellectual property theft may lose market advantages that took years to develop. Healthcare providers face patient safety issues when medical records are compromised. Financial institutions risk regulatory sanctions that can limit business operations.

The integrated DSPM and PDN approach transforms data protection from a reactive to a proactive capability. Instead of hoping security training and policies prevent data leakage, organizations can enforce tag-based protection automatically when using secure channels. This shift from policy-based to technology-enforced security provides measurable risk reduction and demonstrates due diligence to regulators and business partners.

Looking Forward: The Evolution of Enterprise Data Security

Data security is evolving from perimeter-based protection to data-centric security models. Traditional approaches focused on securing networks and endpoints, but modern business requires data to move freely while remaining protected. DSPM provides the visibility foundation for this transition, while technologies like PDN and SafeEDIT enable the control mechanisms.

This evolution reflects broader changes in business operations. Remote work, cloud adoption, and external collaboration are permanent fixtures of modern business, not temporary challenges to be managed. Security architectures must accommodate these realities while providing stronger protection than previous perimeter-based approaches.

The combination of automated discovery, intelligent labeling, and policy-driven enforcement creates security capabilities that scale with business growth. As organizations adopt new applications, expand into new markets, and develop new partnership models, their data protection strategies can adapt automatically without requiring manual security reviews for every business decision.

Moving from Discovery to Protection

DSPM represents a crucial first step in understanding organizational data landscapes. The visibility and labeling capabilities provide essential foundations for any comprehensive data security strategy. However, visibility alone cannot address the fundamental challenge of protecting data during the business activities that create the most risk.

The integration of DSPM labeling with PDN enforcement creates a complete data security lifecycle. Organizations can finally share private information with confidence, knowing that appropriate restrictions will be enforced regardless of who accesses the data or where they’re located. This capability enables business growth while maintaining regulatory compliance and protecting competitive advantages.

The question facing security leaders isn’t whether better data protection is needed. The question is whether they’re ready to transform their DSPM investment from a visibility tool into a complete security solution that protects data throughout its entire business lifecycle. The technology exists to bridge this gap, creating data protection strategies that enable business success rather than constraining it.

Additional Resources

• Blog Post Zero Trust Architecture: Never Trust, Always Verify
• Video How Kiteworks Helps Advance the NSA’s Zero Trust at the Data Layer Model
• Blog Post What It Means to Extend Zero Trust to the Content Layer
• Blog Post Building Trust in Generative AI with a Zero Trust Approach
• Video Kiteworks + Forcepoint: Demonstrating Compliance and Zero Trust at the Content Layer