Systems and methods employing delimiter searches to identify sensitive information in data
AssigneeSecurityMetrics, Inc.
InventorsAlan B. Butt, Nathan K. Stocks
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A data string that includes potentially sensitive information, such as an account number for a payment card, may be evaluated using a delimiter search to provide an increased level of confidence that the data string encodes the sensitive information of interest. A delimiter search may include an evaluation of the bytes adjacent to the beginning and end of the data to determine whether or not those bytes have values that correspond to the values of known delimiters. A data string that is not surrounded by known delimiters may be disregarded (i.e., considered not to comprise sensitive information of interest), while a data string that is surrounded by known delimiters may warrant further evaluation.
Claims29
A system for identifying potentially sensitive information, comprising:
- a scanning device configured to communicate with a memory device that stores data including potentially sensitive information, the scanning device programmed to:
- identify a string of sequential bytes of at least one predetermined length in which each byte has a value corresponding to a decimal number;
- evaluate a preceding byte immediately preceding the string of sequential bytes to determine whether the preceding byte has a value that corresponds to a known delimiter;
- evaluate a following byte immediately following the string of sequential bytes to determine whether the following byte has a value that corresponds to a known delimiter;
- identify each string immediately preceded by a preceding byte with a value corresponding to a known delimiter and immediately followed by a following byte with a value corresponding to a known delimiter as a suspected sensitive data string.
A system for identifying potentially sensitive information, comprising:
- a memory device in which data including potentially sensitive information is stored;
- and
- a scanning device in communication with the memory device, the scanning device programmed to:
- identify a string of sequential bytes of at least one predetermined length in which each byte has a value corresponding to a decimal number;
- evaluate a preceding byte immediately preceding the string of sequential bytes to determine whether the preceding has a value that corresponds to a known delimiter;
- evaluate a following byte immediately following the string of sequential bytes to determine whether the following byte has a value that corresponds to a known delimiter;
- identify each string immediately preceded by a preceding byte with a value corresponding to a known delimiter and immediately followed by a following byte with a value corresponding to a known delimiter as a suspected sensitive data string.
A system for identifying potential payment card numbers, comprising:
- a scanning device for evaluating data stored by a memory device under control of a merchant, the data including potential payment card numbers, the scanning device programmed to:
- identify a string of sequential bytes of about thirteen bytes to about sixteen bytes in which each byte has a value corresponding to a decimal number;
- evaluate a preceding byte immediately preceding the string of sequential bytes to determine whether the preceding byte has a value that corresponds to a known delimiter;
- evaluate a following byte immediately following the string of sequential bytes to determine whether the following byte has a value that corresponds to a known delimiter;
- identify each string immediately preceded by a preceding byte with a value corresponding to a known delimiter and immediately followed by a following byte with a value corresponding to a known delimiter as a suspected payment card number.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.