Whilst both pupils and educational establishments benefit from the use and development of technology, awareness also has to increase of the associated risks that are inherent in that same technology. One area that should be of concern – according to TA Triumph-Adler, is the memory of printers and multifunctional devices (MFDs).
Seen and used every day, they are often taken for granted as they print, scan, email and store anything from pupils’ reports and welfare to a programme for the school play; and the keyword is ‘STORE’ – because all these machines effectively have a substantial hard disk which, if unsecured, can pose a major data risk.
The risk is obvious to anyone who has had to retrieve a file they thought lost on their own computer and it is a risk that Triumph-Adler UK’s managing director, Shaun Wilkinson, is keen to manage.
Shaun explained: “Once we understand that printers store data, the risks become obvious. As a school governor, I became aware of just how much personal information relating to pupils, staff and stakeholders was stored on their printers, and that any data leak could cause huge reputational damage to the school as well as personal damage to individuals. There are also financial threats: contract information, payment details, bank details… on a daily basis school printers handle a wealth of information that could be exploited.”
Such is Shaun’s concern that TA Triumph-Adler are launching a new Data Security Policy at Bett 2014 which guarantees that printed and scanned data is ‘safe as standard’ on all their devices used in the education sector. “Whenever you see our Data Protection Shield, you know that we are protecting your data. Our standard security software encrypts and overwrites the hard disk randomly to prevent data restoration.”
Print with peace of mind: It’s important to be aware of the threat to data protection posed by printers, and even more important to know that solutions exist. Any school that wants to eliminate data leakage would do well to consider TA Triumph-Adler, who are announcing at Bett 2014 that they will be supplying Data Security Kits as standard with all their printers and MFDs to customers in the educational sector.
Paul Young, head of technical services at TA Triumph-Adler, said “Our data security kits come with three overwrite-erase options. Data can be overwritten once for a speedy solution, three times for extra security or, for the ultimate option, using the ‘three passes’ method – which is so extreme it’s compliant with the United States Department of Defence’s data sanitisation standards. We look forward to demonstrating our data security options at Bett.”
