DAM Guide – Securing the data on your multimedia platform

Files that enter the DAM system are (at least in part) stored outside the company and are accessed over the internet by a large number of people. In that case, the security of multimedia files requires access protection and control. At the same time, the security of assets also includes protecting intellectual property and establishing usage conditions. Finally, securing files includes preserving them using secure storage in reliable hosting infrastructure.

In order to secure assets added into the DAM system, access to the multimedia platform is only permitted after users log in with a username and password.

Once logged in, not all users have the same rights and access privileges for the multimedia files. Digital asset management software allows you to create group or individual profiles with customizable rights. By configuring the user rights and access privileges for each type of profile, you can establish the permissions users will have to view, download, index, and modify files. Similarly, you can use profiles to give or restrict access to certain features. For example, with DAM software, you can restrict certain profiles from using the facial recognition tool. These different access right settings allow you to assign differentiated rights for managers and their team members, for example. Thus, a project manager will not have the same access rights as an intern.

In addition, digital asset management software allows you to give temporary access to the multimedia platform for users outside your organization. To make this possible, Ephoto Dam provides a link with a time and date stamp for secure downloading.

This management of user rights and access provides security for your digital assets because it prevents other organizations, like your competitors, from using your multimedia content for their own purposes. In this way, your files are kept private.

DAM software allows you to secure multimedia files via usage conditions. With the multimedia platform, the user must accept the usage conditions, if there are any, before viewing certain files. In the contract or policy laying out the conditions, the user will find information on things like copyright, image rights, the date, and conditions for granting rights to the file.

In order to protect intellectual property and thus protect files from being copied or appropriated by third parties, DAM software like Ephoto Dam allows you to add a watermark or a signature to files.

To avoid both data piracy and data loss (or destruction), files can be secured by securing their storage. As such, hosting infrastructure plays a crucial role. Hosting infrastructure is made up of servers that can store a massive volume of multimedia data. DAM solutions generally rely on several data centers located in different places to ensure that an incident (fire, flood, etc.) doesn’t result in the loss of all data. Thus, data hosted at one site are backed up at another site.

The servers are protected physically against destruction, damage, and intrusion. Access to the data centers is protected, for example, with security guards, security fencing around the center, secured entries requiring a code or a badge, etc. The servers are also protected digitally to prevent data piracy and loss. The data storage infrastructure includes servers and server clusters entirely dedicated to security. It’s protected by firewalls that control the flow of communications on the computer network. Assets are also secured with servers that protect against DDoS attacks that can take the infrastructure offline, in addition to protecting against intrusion (HIDS, NIDS, IPS) and preserving data with backup servers.

To effectively protect data, the Ephoto Dam digital asset management software has three different hosting platforms: in Europe, North America, and Asia. Each of these infrastructure systems is protected by multiple forms of security to ensure data integrity and to prevent data from being stolen or breached. As such, in each of the three locations, the infrastructure includes firewalls, distributed storage clusters, and servers dedicated to updates, monitoring, security (anti-DDoS, HIDS, NIDS, and IPS), and backup.