Large Aerospace and Defense Organization

Acquired for one. Deployed Enterprise-Wide.

Employing more than 170,000 people worldwide, this client uses one of the largest PeopleSoft™ human resources (HR) and payroll systems on the planet. The client recognized the need to protect its employees sensitive, personally identifiable information housed in its numerous databases around the world, to prevent leaking employee social insurance numbers and salary and compensation information. After extending every level of protection to their HR data in the test environment, it then prompted the client to initiate a competitive procurement process to extend masking to databases enterprise-wide, in which Imperva Camouflage rose above the competition.

The Challenge

As a global firm with lines of business spanning the globe, privacy is integral for what this client delivers as a part of its product and services offering. This meant that vulnerable data within their organization needed to be protected to maintain the reputation of quality the company is built on.

The challenge for Imperva was to enhance the privacy and security of database testing to safeguard all copies of live data within the organization. Imperva needed to ensure database copies were realistic in order to guarantee accurate testing and development, and achieve secure and realistic data masking across multiple and varying data stores and complex applications.

The Client

The client is one of the largest aerospace and defense organizations in the world and is a top exporter in the U.S. The client employs more than 170,000 people worldwide and has arguably one of the largest PeopleSoft databases.

An innovator across all lines of business, security is paramount for this client. One of the largest U.S. exporters in terms of sales, this company remains vigilant toward maintaining reliable data controls in the interest of customers, vendors and employees.

Extending every level of protection to their HR data in the test environment prompted this company to initiate a competitive procurement process. The client’s goal was to find a data masking solution that would improve security without compromising the efficiency of database projects that included software development, integration testing and offshoring. Enhanced privacy and security meant that all copies of production HR data had to be safeguarded. Secure database copies had to be realistic in order to guarantee accurate testing and development, yet massive stores of data were spread across multiple databases, varying database types, and complex applications.

The solution

The client chose Imperva Camouflage, our flagship data masking technology, to first mask data in their HR PeopleSoft databases, and then to its payroll databases.

Once the procurement process was initiated, Imperva distinctly rose above the competition. We won over management, and our technology was met with enthusiasm from the client’s development team, for its design and functionality capabilities. De-identifying the information in database copies immediately allowed outsourcing, testing and development work to move forward with enhanced privacy and security.

First Steps

Integrated data masking was implemented in order to maintain relationships across database types and software applications. The Imperva Camouflage data masking solution was tailored to client specifications for maximum flexibility, exemplified by the seamless integration of a new database type at the time (Teradata). After an enthusiastic response from the client’s development team, Imperva ensured that unauthorized access to sensitive information was prevented and job functions that depend on database copies were enabled. This enhanced security facilitated off-site work patterns, immediately contributing to overall productivity. In less than 6 weeks, Imperva was able to add support for the critical application.

Results

After rigorous testing in the HR environment, Imperva Camouflage was deployed to other departments such as Engineering and Product Development. Far beyond the original requirements and expectations of this client, the product met the demands with accelerated development. It has proven to be self-sufficient, requiring minimal support in these new environments.

Today, this client uses Imperva Camouflage to efficiently handle and de-identify over 1 billion records. The most accurate and effective software development , integration testing and offshoring is now taking place. Copies are secure and realistic, directly simulating the client’s live HR database.

Our client approved Imperva Camouflage as the enterprise-standard for data masking and has since upgraded to a worldwide license.

Our clients HR databases were successfully protected using the Imperva Camouflage data masking solution, and the success in the installation prompted the organization to extend the solution securing other sensitive databases across the world. The client continues to use Imperva Camouflage to this day to efficiently secure it’s massive amount of databases, and database types throughout the organization.