Megan Brandow

The insurance industry sits at the crossroads of vast data collection and stringent privacy requirements. Every day, insurance companies process enormous volumes of sensitive customer information—from personal identifiers like Social Security numbers and birthdates to health records, financial details, and property valuations. This mountain of data forms the backbone of the industry’s core functions: underwriting policies, processing claims, detecting fraud, and delivering personalized customer service. However, this wealth of data also creates significant security challenges. As the insurance sector continues its digital transformation journey, the protection of this sensitive information has become not just a regulatory requirement but a critical business imperative. Customer trust, once broken by a data breach, can be nearly impossible to restore. Meanwhile, regulatory frameworks like GDPR, HIPAA, DORA, and various state privacy laws impose increasingly stringent requirements for data protection—with substantial penalties for non-compliance.   Current Data Security Challenges Despite significant investments in cybersecurity, the […]

Transform your business with Paperclip Mojo’s digitization solutions. Discover the benefits of converting your data to a digital format.   Why Businesses Struggle with Document Digitization  Digitization is essential for businesses looking to optimize operations, yet many organizations still rely on outdated, manual processes. The challenges of digitization include slow data entry, human errors, and compliance risks. Companies handling large volumes of documents often struggle with inefficiencies, leading to high operational costs.  Mojo provides a streamlined document digitization solution, leveraging AI-powered automation to ensure accuracy, compliance, and scalability. By digitizing documents into structured digital data, businesses can enhance productivity and improve data management.  What Is Data Digitization and Why Does It Matter?  Data digitization refers to the process of converting analog data into digital formats that can be easily stored, managed, and analyzed. Businesses that rely on paper-based documents often face bottlenecks in their workflows. Digitization allows companies to simplify […]

The January 17th deadline has come and gone, and it’s estimated that 99% of impacted organizations are out of compliance with the European Union’s Digital Operational Resiliency Act (DORA). DORA aims to improve and regulate the digital resiliency of a wide range of financial entities, including credit institutions, investment firms, insurance companies, payment institutions, and others within the EU’s financial sector. These organizations must start down the path of digital resilience and show progress toward compliance with DORA standards in the months ahead—or face the repercussions. Here’s a breakdown of the steps toward digital resilience and risk management of Financial Institutions as mandated by DORA: 1. Establish Risk Management Framework Financial organizations are required to define clear policies, procedures, and governance structures for managing Information and Communications Technology (ICT) risks—and keep them updated. Organizations are required to regularly assess risks related to the ICT systems and services that are critical […]

Gartner recently released their initial guidance for 2025 related to cybersecurity via a paper titled “2024 was a future-forward year! Head into 2025 with our top 5 forward-thinking insights”. After reviewing the paper, I zeroed in on one primary topic—post-quantum cryptography. In my humble opinion, the Gartner recommendations around post-quantum cryptography lack logic and are approaching irresponsibility and abuse of influence. Don’t get me wrong, I have a lot of respect for Gartner’s opinions and recommendations. They have a stable of analysts and access to vast resources supporting their research and opinions. Their influence on organizational decision making has historically been well received and the trust they’ve built is why they’re a global powerhouse for technological guidance. I feel that in this particular case influencing organizations to divert their limited resources away from obtainable goals to a potential future concern is irresponsible. Not all hype is good hype. Yes, we […]

In an era where data breaches and cyberattacks are becoming increasingly sophisticated, securing sensitive information has never been more crucial. The Federal Zero Trust Data Security Guide was built to assist government agencies in implementing Zero Trust framework and better protecting sensitive information. Beyond the government, it’s become a trusted strategy for ensuring data confidentiality and integrity in a decentralized, cloud-first world. For IT and security professionals, understanding and adopting Zero Trust principles is essential in adopting a comprehensive, proactive approach to data protection. What is Zero Trust?  At its core, Zero Trust (ZT) is a security framework based on the principle of “never trust, always verify.” Unlike traditional network security models that rely heavily on perimeter defenses—a “castle and moat” model as seen in the image at the right—ZT assumes that threats can come from both outside and inside the network anytime, anywhere, and by anyone. It advocates for the continuous […]

The European Union’s (EU) Digital Operational Resiliency Act, known as DORA, goes into effect January 17, 2025, and is the first major regulation to specifically mandate data encryption at rest, in transit and in use. For many, this regulation has slipped in under the radar. DORA is an EU regulation and is specifically designed to govern the financial sector, so you may be wondering if it applies to your organization. The short answer is, most likely. Much like GDPR, the “it doesn’t apply to me” debate will be a topic of discussion around DORA for the foreseeable future. There is no question that any  financial institution that does business within the EU, or has EU citizens as clients,  will be held accountable to DORA. Also, if you do business with or support an EU financial institution, you will fall within DORA regulations. And the fines related to being out of […]

In a recent podcast episode from Digital Doorways, the featured guest Marene Allison advises CISOs everywhere to focus on a sustainable data-centric approach and recommends innovative encryption of data-in-use technology to address gaps within operational data security. Marene is a highly respected cybersecurity and Information Technology (IT) leader, advisor, and board member with more than three decades of experience, including as the former Vice President and Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) for Johnson & Johnson. She is featured on the podcast with host Jason Siegel, founder of the cybersecurity-focused digital marketing firm Bluetext. “Everyone needs to have a new primer on encryption and how it can be utilized,” Allison said in the episode. “It can be used at rest, in use, and in transit. You can encrypt all of that today.” Marene continues to discuss how data is rarely in one place—it is moving around and needs to be accessible. […]

On a typical day, cybersecurity solutions hum in the background, diligently protecting businesses from the myriad threats that seek to exploit vulnerabilities. But what happens when an entity you rely on for security faces its own significant outage? CrowdStrike’s service disruption halted air travel, impacted healthcare, and cripped businesses worldwide. And now that the issue has been largely resolved, this technology-related incident provides invaluable lessons for organizations and cybersecurity professionals alike. Here is what we learned from the CrowdStrike outage and how these lessons can bolster our approach to cybersecurity resilience. Redundancy Isn’t Just for Power Supplies The CrowdStrike outage highlighted the critical importance of having operational redundancy built into your cybersecurity strategy. While CrowdStrike is known for its robust security measures, no system is infallible. For organizations relying on a single cybersecurity vendor (or any vendor that controls critical systems), it’s vital to have a backup plan. This might […]

Since Paperclip introduced SAFE® in September 2022, we have been focused on educating the market on the solution and the critical security issues it can solve. We had to answer the question “What is searchable data encryption?” for people who have varying degrees of familiarity with encryption technology. Many organizations already had encryption in motion and at rest but did not know the significance of searchable encryption (often referred to as encryption of data in use). Searchable data encryption is the ability to search data while it remains fully encrypted. This differs from encryption at rest and in motion as those two solutions only encrypt the data while it is in a restful state and that data must be decrypted for search or use. Searchable encryption is a highly beneficial evolution to the way we currently secure data. It’s also the only solution aligned to the way we use data […]