Secure File Sharing: How to Keep Your Company’s Documents Safe

Published in

Synology C2

6 min readJul 1, 2022

In today’s technology-driven world, our data and privacy are among our most valuable assets, and we often take them for granted. We learned this in 2019 during the First American financial data leak, where it was discovered that thousands of private documents were sitting online, available to view for anyone who knew the specific URL. Although that URL was generated to only work for a targeted user, there was no way to verify who that user was or ensure that the URL wasn’t shared.

On the one hand, this seems like a simple oversight, but it is essential to reflect on one’s own business practices. Do you share files and documents with colleagues or clients online using links and portals? Can you verify the security of those hosts?

Mismanagement of document and file sharing and transferring can have immense consequences on an organization’s security, reputation, and client safety. This article will outline the importance of secure file sharing and explore solutions available to your company.

What are the leading causes of company data breaches?

Data breaches are becoming more common across industries, and companies must remain vigilant against cyber-attacks. Here are four of the most common causes of data breaches:

1. Non-secure passwords: Having obvious and easy-to-guess passwords make the hacker’s job easy. Weak credentials, shared passwords, and insufficient authentication increase susceptibility.
2. System vulnerabilities: Too many companies have applications and networks configured in ways that leave holes and openings that make them easy targets. With gaps in the setup, it is easy for hackers to walk right into your confidential information.
3. Permission issues: With folders, apps, and platforms shared and accessed by individuals across an organization, companies quickly lose track of who can access which elements, and without tight control over these parameters, it is easy for access to get out of hand.
4. Malware: There is an increase in threatening software on the web today, so it is essential that employees are trained on how to remain cautious and identify untrustworthy platforms and sources.

From an increasing number of potential causes, it is clear that companies need to re-evaluate their organizational policies and safety measures, especially around how they keep their data and key assets safe. Let us explain the reasons why this is important in more detail.

Why should companies enforce safety measures for document sharing?

Data and documents are often most at risk in the sharing process. It is essential to remember that sharing documents in a business setting requires extra levels of care that might not be the same as an individual’s sharing practices when dealing with personal documents or information at home. Secure file sharing can help prevent:

● The distribution of private information that can happen if employees don’t take extra precautions when sharing data. Using a consumer-quality platform may grant permissions to your data that can come back to harm your company in the future.
● Attacks that can happen as a result of bypassing security blockers to upload or download content quickly.
● Malware installation that happens as an accidental byproduct of downloading files.

The safeguard for document sharing ── C2 Transfer

How to secure the safety of important documents and organizational credentials during sharing processes with external parties becomes essential for organizations to reflect on. With that being said, C2 Transfer, the file-sharing solution can be the cure to all the potential security problems involved.

C2 Transfer is a secure file-sharing service on the cloud with end-to-end encryption and user identity authentication. It offers a user-friendly and straightforward solution for companies to ensure that their data is not at risk or made vulnerable in the upload, download, and sharing process. As a result, C2 Transfer helps organizations prevent the negative consequences that can occur when document sharing is mismanaged.

C2 Transfer — allow professionals and organizations to manage file transfer and request efficiently

You might now be wondering how C2 Transfer achieves such security and performance, let’s dive deeper into C2 Transfer’s capabilities and built-in features:
● End-to-end encryption: Files are kept secure and are encrypted throughout their whole journey, beginning with the sender, while in transit, and when downloaded by the receiver.
● One-time-passwords (OTP): The service uses a two-step authentication process by sending an OTP to the recipient’s phone via SMS or email to ensure that only the singular intended person receives the files.
● Straightforward management and oversight: The management interface is simple and straightforward, allowing business owners to manage licenses and permissions without confusion, preventing any information from getting loose.

C2 Transfer — sending an OTP to the recipient’s phone via SMS or email

Implementing a transfer policy within your company

Having a clear and established transfer policy allows companies to safeguard the flow of information within the organization and between external stakeholders. It ensures that important information never winds up in the wrong hands putting the company and its people at risk. Here’s how business owners can use C2 Transfer to establish a secure file sharing transfer policy within their organization:

Create allow-lists and blocklists to safely restrict and manage particular accesses
Determine who is allowed to receive documents and who is blocked. The organization can create a custom list of recipients and mail domains to help eliminate suspicious recipients from the start.
Add watermarks to documents for an extra safety net
Ensuring that image files and PDF documents will be downloaded with a watermark to prevent any information from being used in an unauthorized manner or from being edited unethically.
Limit download quantities to keep control over your files
Set one-time download limits so the document cannot be re-downloaded after the initial round. This prevents individuals from successfully sharing the link or sharing the link and access code.
Set expiration dates to your file access to ensure full protection
Make sure that download links only last a short duration of time so that old information cannot sit around ready to be accessed. Setting expiration links can also be useful when it comes to sharing resources and documents during contracted partnerships or co-works, making sure resources are shared in the right time and right way.

C2 Transfer — Add link expiration dates, download limits, and watermarks at the file transfer setting before sharing with the recipient

What’s the business advantage?

Instead of using varied and consumer-oriented platforms at the employee level, implementing a system-wide protection policy will ensure that your proprietary data is secure and confined to one system. Ultimately, implementing this secure file-sharing software creates a layer of safety around your organization’s patent rights, thereby lowering the risk of future cyber-attacks and data leaks. Using C2 Transfer allows organizations to create a comprehensive and secure file management system with file-sharing policies and procedures that prevent against harm.

Start protecting your organization’s security with C2 Transfer

Take the simple steps needed to make a major impact on your company’s security levels. Work with C2 Transfer to establish a company-wide transfer policy, lock in secure file sharing, and ensure that only the intended viewers are gaining access to sensitive materials. Data breaches put your company, finances, reputation, employees, and clients at risk, and the solution is simple and accessible. Explore what C2 Transfer can do for your organization by starting a free trial today.