Encryption software market to be driven by stringent compliance regulations of various governments & need for data privacy across enterprises
Need for Encryption software as viable tool in protecting data breaches
Continuous rise in cases of data breaches across organizations and enterprises have led to impending need of encryption tools and methods to protect sensitive information. Not only this, individual user’s need comprehensive encryption software to protect their mobile devices against theft of confidential and private data. Most of the businesses in government and private organizations are conducted through emails that has given rise to imminent need of end-to-end encryption software. The market is fast emerging as a viable tool to encrypt all the organizational data to save them against unauthorized access while transferring massive data over networks and to protect against data being compromised in case of loss or theft of device.
How the tool works
Software-based encryption using specialized encryption software programs enables confidentiality of the data stored in files, folders & disks or transmitted over wireless networks and works essentially in two ways: many software requires that recipients needs to have the same software installed while decrypting and in some cases recipient may not need to have the same software; all such tools use a combination of symmetric keys and asymmetric keys to devise different method for encrypting. This leads to two different types of encryption software, namely, single-user file/folder level and multi-user file/folder level. Single-user file/folder level may employ encryption programs to create an encrypted "virtual drive" or can have built-in encryption features such as in MS Office and OpenOffice. In this case, most encryption software can encrypt files individually using a password or other key. The other one is comparatively complex as multiple users to simultaneously access encrypted information wherein the software must adequately address multi-user file locking issues. Increasing need of data privacy and compliance regulations by various government, coupled with increased adoption of cloud & virtualization along with data mobility in case cloud-based services are key factors that have fostered the growth of the market across regions. On the basis of usage the market can be segmented into encryption for data-at-rest and encryption for data-in-transit.
Trends
A fast emerging segment for enterprise security application is email encryption software which automatically encrypts email messages and attachments that may not necessarily contain sensitive information. For instance, a company can use email this to send confidential personnel information to another organization, like payroll processor; and the software to protect against eavesdropping Internet transit. Large organizations can also permit email the software to work at the client level, thus offering end-to-end protection to emails, that is, from sender to recipient. Those with considerable budgets may use email encryption based on public key infrastructure (PKI), generally more expensive to implement and maintain. However, PKI-based products, are becoming inconvenient tools in protecting emails between organizations due to exchange of keys amongst the organizations. To address this difficulty, email encryption software vendor's cloud-based offering is fast gaining adoption across organizations where contents of the encrypted email can be assessed over an encrypted channel that eliminates the need for any password or other authentication.
Market Prospects
Various marketing verticals that benefit from this software are financial sector, healthcare and public sector. As per a recent report by Allied Market Research titled “World Encryption Software Market - Opportunities and Forecasts, 2014 – 2021”, the financial sector is forecast to occupy the largest market share, driven by stringent data compliance requirements. Overall, the global market is expected to reach $2.5 billion by 2021, growing at a CAGR of 14.2% during 2016-2021.
