Financial Services Firm Unifies & Transforms Data Hygiene Practices with Secure Erasure | Blancco Case Study

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An international banking and financial services company with a major presence in India and operating in 70+ countries standardized its secure data erasure processes with Blancco technologies. A single image now covers everything from day-to-day uses to specialized remote, offline, and third-party scenarios—providing a comprehensive approach to protecting sensitive, end-of-life information. The bank’s automated data erasure processes also streamline regulatory compliance, scaling easily across global operations with less manual effort and allowing the bank to standardize its data hygiene practices.

Highlights

Using Blancco data erasure solutions, a multinational banking and financial services company:

  • Standardizes data destruction practices across business units, technologies, and geographies
  • Monitors data erasures globally and centrally stores certified, tamper-proof erasure reports
  • Ensures regulatory compliance with global and industry data protection requirements, including PCI DSS
  • Limits data access for non-bank employees with custom roles-based data and report views

Challenge

Operating in dozens of countries, an international banking and financial services company with global security operations in India administers a broad spectrum of online and offline data housed in laptops, phones, servers, VMs, LUNs, and more. With that variety of geographies and technologies, the company used a range of data destruction methods as it managed more than 100,000 data storage devices. Using different sanitization methods across regions and device types made it difficult to ensure and document compliance with industry standards such as PCI DSS. In addition, many tools only applied to laptops and desktops, with limited or no support for secure data erasure on servers, virtualized infrastructure, or network storage.

The bank’s inconsistent data sanitization practices consumed valuable time, cost, and labour resources that would be better applied to cyber operations. In fact, poor scalability led to outsourcing data destruction in some cases, further deteriorating the security department’s control over the process. The non-standardized array of approaches also lacked central visibility and coordination, relying on manual erasure reporting that left the process vulnerable to human error. The bank therefore sought a solution to standardize its data hygiene practices.

Solution

To transform and unify its approach to data sanitization, the bank turned to Blancco for a comprehensive, easy-to-use data erasure solution tailored to support its diverse use cases. Blancco’s solution also covered both local and remote erasures and erasures conducted online or offline. Standardization and consistency within the solution enables all secure erasure to be specified with a single image to streamline maintenance and reduce overall sanitization process costs.

The solution supports certified, secure data erasure using:

Blancco’s secure data erasure solution also integrates with the bank’s IT asset management (ITAM) systems. This facilitates erasure scheduling based on when a device reaches end-of-warranty or end-of-life, further standardizing data hygiene practices in a timely manner.

Adding to the security and flexibility of the solution, the bank implemented custom user roles that govern individual operators’ ability to view or change information about the asset being erased. With more than 20 customization options, this capability enabled the bank’s administrators to create roles for contracted technicians, masking sensitive data to protect its privacy.

Results

In implementing the Blancco solution, the bank has reduced risk by improving its security posture and protections for personally identifiable information (PII) and other sensitive data. Standardized secure erasure methods apply data erasure best practices with highly repeatable, less manual processes that scale globally. At the same time, Blancco Management Console provides centralized access and ease of use to monitor and oversee erasures and manage erasure certificates across its global operations.

Key outcomes include:

  • Automation. Robust automation, made possible by integrating Blancco’s data erasure software with the bank’s existing ITAM setup, accelerates the bank’s data sanitization processes, triggering erasures based on scheduled events.
  • ROI. This improved efficiency delivers immediate return on investment by proactively ensuring compliance, unifying reporting, and reducing human touch time. This reduction enables staff to focus on mitigating cyber threats, from intrusions and denial of service attacks to ransomware.
  • Support. Blancco’s 24 x 7 x 365 local technical support ensures reliable, enterprise-class availability.

Together with the tamper-proof audit trail provided by Blancco products, these advances improve the ability to standardize data hygiene across the banks broad and varied IT infrastructure, assess and enforce adherence to industry standards, and comply with data protection regulations.

About Blancco

Reduce Risk. Increase Efficiency. Be Sustainable. Blancco Technology Group (AIM: BLTG) provides organizations with secure, compliant, and automated solutions that accelerate the transition to the circular economy. Each year, tens of millions of Blancco erasures allow top-tier organizations to protect end-of-life data against unauthorized access, safely redeploy data storage assets, and firmly comply with increased data protection and privacy requirements. Our precise device diagnostics help move used IT assets confidently into the circular economy, enabling enterprises, IT asset disposition (ITAD) vendors and recyclers, and mobile industry stakeholders to operate more sustainably.

Globally approved, recommended and certified by governing and industry bodies around the world, Blancco is the industry standard in data erasure and mobile lifecycle solutions. With 35+ patented or patent-pending ideas, we continue to grow the number of innovative solutions global companies can rely on to accelerate operations, secure their data, and grow their businesses. Read more about us at blancco.com.

See how Blancco solutions can automate and standardize data sanitization across your enterprise. Request your Free Data Erasure Trial for Enterprises today.