Viking Yachts Protects Intellectual Property From a Departing Employee

About the Company

Viking Yachts is a premiere yacht manufacturer of quality convertible yachts, open yachts, and motor yachts ranging from 37 to 92 feet.

Building a better boat every day has been Viking Yachts’ philosophy for over five decades.

Headquarters New Gretna, NJ	Industry Manufacturing

Business Type B2C	Company Size 1700+ Employees

CurrentWare Products Used

As the network administrator for Viking Yachts, Vincent Pecoreno knows his network and his people like the back of his hand.

As the company grew he was responsible for supporting over 530 users and 1500 devices across multiple geographic locations, making visibility a challenge without the right tools in place.

To continue supporting the employees who make Viking Yachts’ vision of quality yachts possible, Vincent knew that he needed solutions for monitoring and controlling internet use and the flow of data in the company.

After some searching Vincent was delighted to have found the CurrentWare team. With CurrentWare he received more than quality software; he got the expertise and professionalism that the Viking Yachts team looks for when selecting their partners.

“CurrentWare saved us a lot of time and money. If we didn’t have them we would’ve never known what was going on. I can’t thank all of you enough for this software.”

Vincent Pecoreno

Network Administrator, Viking Yachts

ATTEMPTED CORPORATE ESPIONAGE
Ex-Employee Tries to Steal Their Proprietary Data for a Competitor

When an employee in their company put in their 3-weeks notice, Vincent was tasked with auditing their USB activity with AccessPatrol.

To his dismay he found evidence of the soon-to-be-ex-employee transferring 400+ highly valuable proprietary design files to a portable storage device. Once confronted with the evidence, they confessed to their crimes.

“When the employee was questioned about the data transfer he admitted to it because he knew we had the absolute evidence to take him to trial.

I cannot thank all of you enough for this software, being able to audit removable drives is invaluable.“

Without the visibility provided by AccessPatrol the soon-to-be-ex employee would have gotten away with stealing Viking Yachts’ designs and giving a competitor a significant competitive advantage.

“He was going to work for a competitor, so he would have had carte blanche of all the designs we used.

That would have been pretty catastrophic because he would have been using our information to build boats that we’ve sold successfully.”

Vincent Pecoreno

Network Administrator, Viking Yachts

Screenshot of AccessPatrol's activity log with evidence sensitive files transferred to USB storage devices

accesspatrol USB file operations history activity log

Why Do Employees Steal Data?

The data security risks of offboarding employees simply cannot be understated. It’s been reported that 70% of intellectual property theft occurs within the 90 days before an employee’s resignation announcement.

The Key Reasons Employees Steal Data

Competitive Edge: Ex-employees may steal intellectual property to gain favor with a competing company; this is a form of corporate espionage.
Financial Gain: The 2020 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report found that 86% of breaches are financially motivated. Sensitive data is incredibly valuable to a variety of threat actors.
Entitlement: 72% of business decision-makers in the 2018 Data Exposure Report by Code42 believe they are entitled to corporate data that they contributed to, such as source code.
Revenge: Employees that are being involuntarily terminated, passed over for a promotion, or denied a raise are more likely to steal corporate data as a way of “getting back” at the company.

Corporate espionage: Crushing cases of IP theft

stop data theft during employee offboarding

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How to Keep Data Safe When Offboarding Employees

70% of intellectual property theft occurs within 90 days of an employee’s resignation.

Are you concerned about the damage a terminated employee could cause with access to sensitive corporate information, account passwords, and other proprietary data?

Follow these best practices to ensure data security when offboarding employees.

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How Viking Yachts Uses CurrentWare Day-to-Day

Along with protecting their confidential data with AccessPatrol, Viking Yachts uses BrowseControl and BrowseReporter to manage employee internet and application usage.

Trust is paramount to Viking Yachts’ family-owned business, but they also need to verify that their computer usage policies are being followed.

Thanks to BrowseReporter’s user activity reports they can easily audit the internet and application usage of employees that are suspected of misusing company computers.

CurrentWare provides valuable insights into how well new employees are doing. Vincent keeps an eye on their internet, application, and USB device usage to ensure that they are using company equipment as expected.

If there are any issues Vincent can provide managers and human resources staff with the information they need to give further guidance to their new employees.

“CurrentWare then and now is still my favorite product, and I’ve been in this business for over 26 years. We have all the data we need.”

Vincent Pecoreno

Network Administrator, Viking Yachts

Why Vincent Chose CurrentWare

It’s no secret that Vincent has been more than impressed with his 6+ years as a CurrentWare customer.

Whether it be protecting Viking Yachts’ intellectual property, enforcing their computer use policies, or protecting their network against web-based threats, CurrentWare has been there to make managing their network and users easier than ever.

“My main reasons for choosing CurrentWare was the very fair cost per user and overall solid product that gave more options with a lower price tag, high accuracy, and solid customer support.

CurrentWare has a long history of being there. Whenever we need something, I can call you guys up and you’re there. You go above and beyond in helping.”

As for the future? The flexibility and capabilities of the CurrentWare Suite provides Viking Yachts with plenty of options as their needs evolve.

“We tend to work in the office but we know that CurrentWare is there for us if employees need to work from home. Being able to control portable storage devices and internet usage on laptops is going to be a great help.”

“Other companies don’t give the attention and support you need. They force you through thousands of switch boards and FAQs before you can get a hold of someone.

With CurrentWare I know that when I need them I can just call them up and deal with them on the phone.”

Vincent Pecoreno

Network Administrator, Viking Yachts