The 7 Most Effective Data Masking Techniques 2023-01-15, 23:20

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The 7 Most Effective

Data Masking
Techniques

DataMasking
OriginalDataandDocuments

(PII
Customer
Database

Name: JaMaskeddata
Email: jsMaskeddatan
602AbingdonWay
Atlanta

Invoice
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Database 36
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Gender:FeMaskeddata

Amitai Richman
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The 7 Most Effective Data Masking Techniques 2023-01-15, 23:20

Amitai Richman
Product Marketing Director
July 20, 2022

  

For many companies, data masking is the best way to ensure

data security and compliance, but which techniques are best for
your business?

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What are Data Masking Techniques?

What Data Should be Masked?
The 7 Most Effective Data Masking Techniques
The 5 Top Data Masking Challenges
A Data Product Platform Does it All

What are Data Masking Techniques?

Data masking is a process of data obfuscation that involves creating
a version of data that is structurally similar to original data, but
masks or hides sensitive information. Data masking techniques refer

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The 7 Most Effective Data Masking Techniques 2023-01-15, 23:20

to the different methods of obscuring sensitive data, such as

pseudonymization, anonymization, and scrambling, among others.

The objective of every data masking technique is to protect sensitive

data while providing a functional substitute to serve various
purposes, such as user training, software testing, or sales demos.

In effect, masked data is worthless in the event of a breach, while

enabling data consistency and usability across multiple databases
and analytics platforms. The process is irreversible to ensure full
protection.

Keep reading to learn more about data masking techniques, top

challenges, and how a data product approach handles both.

What Data Should be Masked?

Different industries and sectors are compelled to comply with
different data privacy regulations. Therefore, every company has
different priorities when evaluating data masking solutions,
depending on the type of sensitive data they need to protect.

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Just as it sounds, PII is data like full names, drivers license
numbers, social security numbers, and passport numbers, that
can be used to identify an individual.

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The 7 Most Effective Data Masking Techniques 2023-01-15, 23:20

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PHI refers to medical and insurance-related data, collected by
healthcare service providers, including demographic information,
test and laboratory results, medical conditions, and prior claims.

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PCI, as it relates to the Payment Card Industry Data Security
Standard (PCI DSS), refers to credit and debit cardholder data.
According to the standard, companies that process or accept
credit and debit card payments must secure this data.

Data masking is an effective solution for securing sensitive data

found in both structured and unstructured data stores, such as
images, PDF contracts and agreements, drivers licenses, XML, and
more. For example, if you store medical Xles as PDFs, you can
ensure all sensitive information is adequately protected.

The 7 Most Effective Data Masking Techniques

1. Data anonymization
Anonymization is a method of information sanitization that
involves removing or encrypting the sensitive data found in a
dataset. It minimizes the risk of a breach when data is in transit,
and also maintains the structure of the data to support
analytics.

2. Data pseudonymization
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The 7 Most Effective Data Masking Techniques 2023-01-15, 23:20

Pseudonymization swaps sensitive information, such as a name

or drivers license number, with a Xctional alias or random
Xgures. This is a reversible process, and can also be applied to
unstructured data, like a photocopy of a passport.

3. Encrypted lookup substitutio!

Another technique for masking production data is creating a
lookup table that provides realistic alternative values to sensitive
data. These tables must be encrypted to prevent a breach.

4. Redaction
Redaction involves replacing sensitive data with generic values
in development and testing environments. This technique is
useful when the sensitive data itself isn’t necessary for QA or
development, and when test data can differ from the original
datasets.

5. Shu?ing
Instead of substituting data with generic values, shu\ing is a
technique that randomly inserts other masked data. For
example, instead of replacing employee names with fake ones, it
scrambles all of the real names in a dataset, across multiple
records.

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If data includes conXdential dates, you can apply policies to
each data Xeld to conceal the true date. For example, you can
set back the dates by 100 or 1,000 days, randomly, to maximize

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The 7 Most Effective Data Masking Techniques 2023-01-15, 23:20

concealment.

7. Nulling out
This data masking technique protects sensitive data by applying
a null value to a data column, so unauthorized users won’t be
able to see it.

The 5 Top Data Masking Challenges

1. Format preservation
The data masking solution must be able to understand what the
data represents, otherwise it will be di^cult to preserve the
format of the original data. This requirement is especially
important for datasets that require a speciXc format or order,
such as dates, ID numbers, or telephone numbers.

2. Referential integrity
Referential integrity refers to masking each type of sensitive
data with the same algorithm to ensure consistency across
databases. Data masking tools and processes must be
synchronized across the organization for each data type, to keep
it functional for analytics and other use cases.

3. Semantic integrity
Semantic integrity refers to masking the data in a way that
preserves its meaning. For example, if you were to mask a range
of ages, the new values should fall within the original range. For

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The 7 Most Effective Data Masking Techniques 2023-01-15, 23:20

example, a 69 year old man might have his age masked as

somewhere between 66 and 74.

4. Gender preservation
When obfuscating names that need to remain private, the data
masking system must have the ability to decipher the correct
gender associated with the name. If names are changed
randomly, the gender distribution in a table will be altered.

5. Data uniqueness
If the sensitive data in a dataset is unique, as in the case of a
Social Security Number, the data masking solution should apply
unique values for each data element. The solution should also
support referential integrity and collision avoidance functionality.

A Data Product Platform Does it All

A Data Product Platform enables data masking best practices,
while resolving common data masking challenges. It delivers all of
the data related to a speciXc business entity – such as customers,
payments, orders, and devices – to authorized data consumers.

Unlike many other data protection solutions, which centralize

sensitive information, a Data Product Platform persists and
manages every instance of a business entity in its own individually
encrypted Micro-Database™.

With a data product approach, it’s easy to protect data – at rest, in

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use, and in transit – for production, testing, and analytics

environments. It performs both dynamic and static masking on
structured and unstructured data, while maintaining referential
integrity. Images, PDFs, text Xles, and other unstructured data Xelds
that might contain sensitive data are protected, while analytical and
operational workloads can continue running without interference.

For companies that require a range of data masking techniques,

and want to avoid the vulnerabilities associated with conventional
solutions, a Data Product Platform is the way to go.

Enhance data
masking
with data products.
Learn More

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