Digital Guardian among 16 Boston tech firms to watch in 2016. The company was placed 148th on the list of top 500 cybersecurity firms in the world, released by Cybersecurity Ventures in 2015. Products and services A data loss prevention software platform, Digital Guardian integrates content, context and location awareness along with encryption and data level controls to reduce the risk of information loss or misuse, and purposeful data theft. Its host-based security technology empowers organizations to monitor, control, audit and prevent data from wrongful disclosure or malicious theft, while automatically enforcing data security policies and procedures. This scalable platform provides multiple, independent layers of protection to enable secure data sharing across physical, virtual, mobile and cloud environments. The architecture of the platform has three parts: Digital Guardian for Data Visibility and Control enables users to understand where an organization's sensitive data is and how it's being used with kernel-level data visibility, while also delivering device control and encryption. Digital Guardian for Data Loss Prevention adds deeper data visibility and fine-grained control and protection to stop insider threats, and includes advanced classification by context, content and user with email and file control and encryption. Digital Guardian for Advanced Threat Protection provides real-time threat protection by following the attack sequence from initial contact through many attack stages, while offering flexible controls to defend in a manner commensurate with the customer's risk tolerance. It also extends the existing security ecosystem with integrations with network solutions, like FireEye, and SIEM technologies, such as Splunk. Digital Guardian allows businesses to host and manage on premise or choose managed security programs. When deployed as a managed service, Digital Guardian does not collect the actual data itself. Rather, it aggregates the metadata about the files and documents and watches for patterns of activity. Metadata is encrypted, hashed and digitally signed before being transferred to Digital Guardian's hosting facilities via FIPS 140-2 certified messaging protocol. Digital Guardian then provides updated analytics, alerts and reports. Administrators can continuously monitor data, application and system access and usage, whether end users are online, offline or in virtual environments. Organizations can apply specific risk-based policy controls to adhere to data governance and compliance rules. For example, the health service organization Cigna uses Digital Guardian software to monitor all ports and encrypt data transfers. When employees try to transfer files to a USB flash drive, they are prompted to type in the