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Patented Technology and Your Law Firm’s Cybersecurity

The Extra Mile: Patented Technology and Your Law Firm’s Cybersecurity

If you were asked to rate the importance of data and cybersecurity on a scale of 1-10, odds are you would choose 10. After all, cyber breaches can destroy your business, tarnish your reputation, and leave you vulnerable to legal and professional consequences. Yet, you are likely not doing everything you could be doing to protect your law firm and your clients’ data from cyber attack. Nothing less than military-grade, patented cybersecurity in protecting your clients’ confidential information will suffice in converting that aspirational “10” into real-world measures.

Are you following industry standards and guidelines like NIST’s in protecting your data? Even if you are, that’s still not the utmost you could be doing. Other agencies and security teams may assure you that their security techniques are enterprise-level and cutting edge. GrowPath’s procedures, though, include patented cybersecurity technology, meaning no other organization has these methods available. And these patented methods aren’t just alternatives to current procedures — they’re upgrades.

The Bare Minimum of Cybersecurity

Before addressing the advantages of GrowPath technology, let’s review a few basic security protocols. The following are some baseline measures against law firm cyber breaches that you should be employing in order to meet industry standards:

  • Using reCaptcha challenges to deflect bot attacks.
  • Setting password reset tokens to expire within an hour or less.
  • Filtering undesirable external domains and preventing them from transmitting data.
  • Constantly changing cookies as the user moves about the system.
  • Tightly controlling access and limiting user permissions for performing designated functions.

Naturally, GrowPath satisfies these requirements. But that’s hardly the end of the discussion.

The Umbrella Cybersecurity Coverage of the Cloud

Many software platforms, including GrowPath, rely on Google’s Cloud as the initial umbrella of coverage to protect clients’ electronic data. Google provides rigorous world-class security and boasts countless compliance certifications. Google Cloud protects and encrypts your data both at rest and in transit.

In protecting you from dire digital threats, GrowPath doesn’t rely solely on Google’s credentials. Data backups, for example, are crucial in keeping your business running in the event of a cyber attack on your law firm. Aside from backups on the cloud, GrowPath backs up your data offline and onsite. Your backup servers are only accessible to GrowPath administrators and the server suite is always physically monitored. Fire suppression systems, redundant power, and heavily circumscribed accessibility rounds out the thorough protection. To learn more on this matter, read our article: Legal Cloud Security Not All Clouds Are Created Equal.

Application and Information Cybersecurity

GrowPath implements user-friendly but military-grade methods to defend you from malicious actors. For example:

Passphrase Over Password: Do you consistently forget your complicated password with its various symbols and numbers? Of course you do. When this happens, you have to go through the process of resetting your password. Or, to forestall the issue, you might have your password written down as a handy reminder. The former can be immensely frustrating (especially if you’re in a rush) and the latter is clearly a security concern. A better option for satisfying password complexity requirements (while actually being able to remember your login information) is a passphrase. With a passphrase such as “The Purple Cow Wins!” your login information meets industry standards while brute-force password hacking attempts are rendered largely ineffective.

Constant Vigilance: GrowPath’s software is monitored 24/7, 365 days of the year. In addition to routine monitoring, GrowPath periodically conducts risk assessments on its systems and performs stringent internal audits. On top of these steps, GrowPath brings in external security auditors to perform penetration tests and probe system defenses.

Protect Your Platform Through Patented Cybersecurity: Preventing a Cyber Breach of Your Law Firm

Your current case management software may already be utilizing all of the techniques described above. The items below, however, are unique to GrowPath and legally enshrined through patents. These are the innovative patented cybersecurity strategies against law firm cyber attacks that no other platform can offer:

Data Obfuscation: Do you handle extremely sensitive information such as clients’ social security numbers? Of course you do. These are a very tempting target for hackers. Growpath’s patented technique converts confidential information like social security numbers from text into images and hides the converted images in your database. Authorized users can easily view the image, while the absence of the actual numbers in your database means there’s nothing to be hacked.

Image Authentication: GrowPath offers a superior, patented method of authentication to protect your confidential data. Use an image only you know and integrate it with your account. This becomes your unique token and a state-of-the-art second factor for verifying your identity at login.

How GrowPath’s Patented Image Authentication Works

When prompted, you upload your unique image to substantiate your authorization at login. Image authentication is used in addition to the traditional password, as a second factor in your authentication process. For accessing a site, this is a singularly secure way of safeguarding your data from actors who mean you harm.

You might be thinking that you already have a complex password of letters, numbers, and symbols. You also use a text verification process as your second authentication factor; are there really superior steps to take in protecting your devices and login information as part of your law firm cybersecurity?

It’s important to recognize that hackers are highly sophisticated. If someone has access to your text messages and you receive a validation code, they know where to go to find that code (text messages all collect in the same place). In contrast, even if someone knows which picture you’re using for authentication — and which site you’re using it to log in for — they still need to discover where you keep the image.

While no authentication method is completely foolproof, you can see how this makes strides in caulking cracks and loopholes in traditional authentication and security processes. You can use a different image for each site, each kept in a separate location on your device. This dramatically enhances your layers of data protection.

GrowPath’s Image Authentication vs. Biometrics

Why is GrowPath’s patented cybersecurity image authentication superior to popular biometric methods of authentication? Simple: it doesn’t require you to buy any new hardware components. With just software, image authentication can provide you with a patented substantiation process unlike any other.

One bout of biometric complacency means your fingerprint or facial data is no longer in your control. Think it’s impossible for a hacker to duplicate your fingerprint from afar? Not according to Forbes. What happens if the image you selected for authentication is compromised? You can change it to a slightly different image and frustrate your would-be hacker. You cannot, however, change your fingerprint or face.

The Patented Cybersecurity Difference

Meeting industry standards with your data security is important. This does not mean, though, that your sensitive client information is as safe as it can be. GrowPath uses military-grade protection and unique processes that surpass common industry standards. Secure, advanced, patented cybersecurity that’s the GrowPath way.

December 06, 2019