Continental standardises encryption

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Automotive industry supplier Continental, best known for making tyres, is standardising and centralising its use of encryption technology to secure its corporate laptops.

The tyre manufacturer is rolling the technology out to its 6,000-strong mobile workforce who need to manage potentially sensitive and confidential data on the move as the latest phase in a programme to strengthen its security measures.

"An encryption solution that handles individual files or containers isn't suitable for securing a laptop hard disk because it doesn't protect temporary and swap files," said Thomas Ullrich, Continental chief security officer and head of the company's internet and intranet security competence centre.

"Plus, such solutions require users to store sensitive files in protected areas. If you want to protect data on a laptop, you can either encrypt individual files, parts of the hard disk using a 'container' approach, or the entire hard disk."

Continental has chosen to deploy PGP Whole Disk Encryption, which provides non-stop disk encryption, including boot sectors, system and swap files and integration with Microsoft Active Directory to automate user enrolment and manage encryption policy.

It will also install PGP Universal Server for centralised web-based administration of applications, users, policies, provisioning, logging and reporting enabled by the email and data encryption software provider's Encryption Platform.

"Best of all, we didn't have to touch every laptop - it's centrally deployed and managed," said Ullrich, adding that the remote management capability, ease of administration and transparency to users would benefit the company's data security and reputation.

"A security breach could have a tremendously negative effect on our relationships with our customers and brand," he said.

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