Late in the autumn of 2016, Microsoft announced that its purchase acquisition of LinkedIn had been finalized for a price of $26.2 billion. The deal attracted a great deal of scrutiny from investors , and attention from commentators , who calculated that Microsoft had paid about $260 per monthly active user. LinkedIn had other assets besides its database of information on more than 433 million registered users worldwide, including a near-monopoly on professionally-oriented social networking, and significant relational and intellectual capital in its Silicon Valley-based workforce. But the user data―and the question of its worth―was at the center of most conversations about the deal.
Did Microsoft pay too much? Or was $26.2 billion a fair market valuation for what is essentially the world’s largest work history database?
The answers to these questions are far from simple or clear. There’s no precise formula for pricing user data in today’s business environment. But the questions are highly relevant for all decision-makers charged with keeping their business’s most valuable assets safe, even as this task grows increasingly more complex and daunting.
Data: The World’s Most Valuable ResourceIt has become a truism among business leaders and financial analysts: data is the oil of the twenty-first century , the most valuable commodity in the digital age. Those businesses best able to make use of―and extract value from―their data will see the fastest growth and have the most potential to dominate their industries in the coming years.
But data is unique among highly valuable business assets in several ways, including the difficulty and complexity of accurately assessing its value. What also distinguishes data from other business asset classes is its tendency to exhibit increasing returns to use . Most conventional physical assets tend to depreciate in value over time: buildings age and require repair, technology systems become obsolete, etc. And the more often and more rigorously they’re used, the faster they decay. Data, in contrast, tends to become more valuable the more often it’s used.
In order for companies to maximize the opportunities that their data offers them, however, they need to make that data available to users, thinkers and algorithms across their organizations. Ease of access to data is what enables businesses to become more agile and more responsive to their customers.
Business Agility And Information Security RisksToday’s businesses need information systems that will permit them to extract the greatest possible value from their data. Whether it’s remembering customers’ preferences to encourage repeat business, or deeply understanding website user experiences in order to increase cross-selling and drive online booking, data can be used to improve outcomes and solve business problems. Increasingly, this data is also being used to enhance customer experiences. But in order to be useful, this data must be captured, stored and made available at many points within and outside of the organizations.
Each of these processes―the data’s capture, storage, transmission, use and reuse―adds another point of potential information security vulnerability.
As security expert and Fortinet CEO Ken Xie explains in a recent interview , the needs of today’s businesses change far more quickly than their infrastructures. Despite recent increases in IT security investment, security teams have struggled to keep pace with the rapid evolution of open, borderless networks and the demand for ubiquitous, always-on data accessibility.
It is no longer effective to focus on security the network at its borders because these have become too porous and difficult to define. End users increasingly rely on a variety of connected endpoints to access and manipulate high-value data from diverse locations (imagine checking your personal financial information, which is stored in the cloud, from your mobile phone). Today’s data is everywhere, and its security must travel with it.
Building Information Security to Enable GrowthAs global IT security spending continues to climb, stakeholders face increasingly complex decisions. It is of course important to ensure you’re getting the most effective risk prevention for each dollar you spend on information security solutions. But it’s also critical to ask whether your business is choosing an information security solution that will allow you to maximize your data’s value, and will enable its appreciation as an asset.
Increasing your data’s usability means that it can no longer be confined behind a firewall or contained solely within an on-premises server. It means you need a solution that doesn’t interfere with usability―whether your employees are working from home, working on tablets or other personal devices, or working with cloud-based, as-a-service applications. It means that you need a multi-layered platform approach that can detect threats on local devices, remotely connected devices and in processes hosted in the cloud. And it means you need a seamlessly integrated platform in which all parts communicate and work well together.
Every business is different. The solution that will best enable your organization to access and make use of your data is one that takes the unique needs of your employees, partners and customers into account. It’s one that’s been developed on the basis of a thorough examination of your existing infrastructure, and one that’s been designed with your priorities and plans for growth in mind.
If you’re looking for a solution that not only doesn’t interfere with your data’s usability, but actually enhances it, customization is key. By fine-tuning your deployment so that it includes processes and procedures that support your productivity while minimizing risk, you can configure your system to work for you . You can choose incident response and security alert policies that make sense for your industry, business size, and compliance requirements. And you can choose system components that will fit your budget as well.
To learn more about how Netswitch’s three-step CARE implementation process ensures that every Secureli deployment is customized to address an individual organization’s unique risks, contact us today.