This year, the stakes for regulatory compliance are higher than ever. Organizations face an increasingly complex landscape of data protection and privacy regulations, many of which impose strict requirements on how you move, process and store sensitive data during file transfers. Secure file transfers are no longer just a best practice — they are a compliance imperative.
As discussed in a previous blog post, file transfer data breach risk is real, and the consequences are costly. This blog post explores why secure file transfers are critical in today’s regulatory environment and how businesses can meet compliance demands with the right solutions.
Regulatory mandates around the globe influence how organizations manage file transfers. These laws, designed to safeguard sensitive data and protect individual privacy, hold businesses accountable for data security. Here are some of the key regulations that may affect your own file transfer workflows:
|
Regulation |
Data affected |
Sectors or organizations covered |
|
HIPAA |
Electronic protected health information (ePHI), e.g., personally identifiable patient data, medical and health data, payment and insurance details |
Healthcare providers, health plans and business associates handling ePHI |
|
PCI DSS |
Cardholder data (e.g., primary account number, cardholder name, expiration date, authentication data) |
Organizations processing, storing or transmitting payment card information |
|
GDPR |
Personal data of European Union residents |
Any organization handling personal data of EU citizens |
|
CCPA |
Personal data of California residents |
Businesses serving California residents |
|
SOX |
Financial data |
Publicly traded companies in the United States |
|
FISMA |
Federal information and sensitive data |
US federal agencies and their contractors |
|
Data localization laws |
Personal and sensitive data (varies by country) |
Organizations handling data in countries with data localization requirements (e.g., China, Russia) |
When you use insecure methods to transfer files containing sensitive data, you expose your business to significant regulatory risks. These include the following:
To comply with regulations affecting your organization, you must implement the security controls those regulations require. Most of them require the following controls:
Investing in secure and compliant file transfers makes sound business sense. Here’s why.
MFT platforms, like JSCAPE by Redwood, deliver secure and compliant file transfers through a centralized, automated, and easy-to-manage solution. JSCAPE, in particular, already comes with an array of security controls, including: data-at-rest and data-in-motion encryption, strong authentication, access control, data integrity, audit logs, data loss prevention (DLP), malware protection, high availability and many others.
These built-in controls simplify compliance because you normally have to integrate several disparate security tools to acquire the security capabilities these controls provide. With MFT, you can have all these controls baked into a single solution. This allows all these controls to work cohesively and, as a result, reduces your administrative overhead.
When I was a member of the JSCAPE tech support staff, I was often asked to fill out compliance questionnaires for file transfer-related regulatory requirements. In almost all cases, I didn’t have to recommend any additional third-party solutions, as JSCAPE’s built-in controls easily satisfied every single requirement on their own.
In today’s evolving regulatory landscape, secure file transfers aren’t just a technical necessity — they’re a compliance imperative. Don’t leave your organization exposed to security and regulatory risks. Discover how JSCAPE’s highly secure architecture can protect your sensitive data and simplify compliance.
Download our free guide: “How to secure file transfers in the breach era”