Data Breach Prevention Tips for Multinational Companies

Searching for data breach prevention tips for multinational companies? You might be surprised by what you’ll learn in this post that you likely won’t find in other articles.

In this post, we’re not only going to provide you with basic data breach prevention tips for multinational companies. We’re going to start by highlighting a typically unseen area of vulnerability for businesses that operate globally in some way, shape or form.

Whether you market to international audiences, do business with foreign stakeholders or employ virtual workers whose native language is not your own, you must learn this number one overlooked vulnerability.

Continue reading to learn actionable data breach prevention tips for multinational companies, and your organization can avoid becoming the next Equifax.

Data Breach Prevention Tip #1 for Multinational Companies

Assess Your Translation Software’s Level of Security

The most overlooked of data breach prevention tips for multinational companies is to assess the level of security included in the language translation software your company uses.

If you read “translation software” and immediately questioned whether or not your company even uses language translation software, this raises a red flag. Doing business internationally means that your company is likely translating marketing content, HR documents, contracts, financial reports, emails, strategy decks and more.

Unless you’ve hired a professional translation agency to translate all of these, your employees are likely the ones translating these materials using some sort of tool or software.

Once you have determined what method(s) your company is using to translate documents and text from one language to another, refer to the information below regarding what to look out for when assessing the level of risk that comes with those methods of translation.

Regardless of whether your global company is using a translation agency, free online translation tools or premium enterprise translation software, you’ll soon learn the reasons you need to assess the level of security of each.

At the end of this post after we provide data breach prevention tips for multinational companies, we’ll make a suggestion for the best method that ensures your company’s information is protected.

Free Online Translation Tools & Software
Go to a search engine and type “translate” into the search bar. You’ll find out within seconds the most popular method that people use to translate text and documents. It’s likely that your employees are using this very method to communicate internationally.

Free apps, tools and other free websites where you input data will often repurpose data for their own gain.

Whether they sell this data to third parties, publish it, or quietly use it for their own internal purposes, you need to keep in mind that this data is at the very least being stored somewhere.

With most free online tools, you better believe that they aren’t offering a high level of data protection.
Whether they’re storing it without encryption, running the translations over a non-secure connection or have Terms of Service that claim your use of the tool gives them a license to use your data, your information likely isn’t safe from unwanted eyes.

This makes free online translation tools and software an important matter when it comes to data breach prevention tips for multinational companies.

Human Translation or Translation Agency
Human translation is quite possibly safer than using free online translation tools, as long as the human translators aren’t using non-secure software or tools.

Many translation agencies and freelance human translators will use software that speeds up the translation process by running data through a machine translation tool first. Then, they’ll tweak the translation in areas where the translation isn’t totally accurate.

So even if you pay someone to translate your content, they’re likely entering your data into software — or maybe even a free online translation tool to keep their own costs down.

Make an request to your translation agency to disclose which tools and storage methods they’re using, and investigate the level of security of those. If you want to be 100% sure that your data is safe with these agencies or freelancers, require that they use the secure translation software we recommend at the end of this post.

Enterprise Translation Software
If you’re paying for enterprise translation software, a high level of security really should be included in your plan — but keep in mind that most often it is not.

No matter which translation software your company uses, you should look for the following security features in your plan:

• SHA-2 and 4096-bit encryption

• 256-bit SSL certification

• Encrypted file storage in transit, in use and at rest via AWS

• “No Return” to machine translation providers

• PCI-compliant payment processing via Stripe

• HIPAA, SOC1 and ISO27001 compliant datacenters

• Multi-Factor Authentication

• TLS 1.2 (Transport Layer Security)

• Last login date and time display in footer

• Automatic session logoff if idle

• Password expires after one year

• Auto-lock after failed password attempts

• Device Authentication

• Compliant with GDPR & HIPAA

• Single Sign-On

• Supports secure browsers; Chrome, Firefox, Edge & Safari

• Third-party security audit & assessment records

You can send this list to any translation software company and ask them to check off which of these their software includes. In addition, you should always carefully read the EULA for the software to ensure they don’t reserve the right to index, share or publish your data.

More Data Breach Prevention Tips for Multinational Companies

1. Train your employees on data safety policy and provide written guidelines

2. Make it very clear what is permitted and what isn’t involving the transfer/handling of data, and retrain them on this periodically

3. Survey your employees on the types of software they’re missing and need, that they might be likely to substitute free online tools for

4. Provide your employees with safe alternatives to those

5. Vet new employees and conduct background checks

6. Secure all company computers with password protection and timeout functionality

7. Provide computers that are dedicated to company work only

8. Encrypt all data transmission

9. Store physical files in a restricted access area, and fully destroy sensitive printed materials before disposing — train all employees on this as well

10. Manage the use of external storage media such as USB’s, and ensure that only encrypted data can be downloaded to an external device

If this sounds time-consuming and expensive, remind yourself that a data breach is even more expensive.

Conclusion

Data breach prevention for multinational companies goes far beyond firewalls and antivirus software. One of the most overlooked vulnerabilities is unsecured translation tools, which are often used without scrutiny. Whether it’s free online software, human translators using third-party tools, or even paid enterprise solutions, ensuring your translation methods meet strict security standards is essential. Combine this with robust employee training, encrypted data handling, and strict access controls to build a multi-layered defense. The time and resources spent on proactive security now are far less costly than recovering from a data breach later.