What is Broad-Spectrum Data Access Governance?

In the early 2010s, the focus of data security and protection began to expand from records in database applications, termed as “structured data,” to file-based data known as “unstructured data.”

Following some high-profile data breaches, many organizations learned the hard way that their sensitive information wasn’t just the personal identifiable information (PII) of their employees and customers. It was also the organizations’ “crown jewels.” Setting the organization apart competitive, it contained marketing plans in presentation files, merger and acquisition plans in word processing files, yet-to-be-released sales numbers in spreadsheets, and other confidential information inside unstructured data.

Gartner soon designated a new market segment of software for identifying and securing sensitive unstructured data, christening it “data access governance.” According to Gartner: “Data access governance (DAG) provides assessments, management, and real-time monitoring for unstructured and semistructured data in file repositories. Its primary purpose is to determine, manage and monitor who has ...