Upon completion of a scan, Identity Finder will present a report of all PII found with options to electronically Shred (delete), Scrub (redact), or Ignore the data. You must review and remediate all results – meaning they must be removed, replaced or moved to a network share.

Step 1

Open the Identity Finder results screen which shows the file location, modified date, size, type of match, and the number of matches. The preview pane on the right shows a portion of the selected document with the results highlighted.

identity finder screenshot

Note: the examples in these screenshots are sample data and do not indicate real identities.

Step 2

Review all matches to determine what action should be taken on each. You can review each in their entirety by right clicking the result and selecting Launch.

Identity finder screenshot

Step 3

Decide what action should be taken for each item following the guide below:

identity finder decision chart


identity finder icon

 

Ignore– if an item found is a false positive or is a file that needs to be kept intact, the result can be ignored to prevent it from showing up in future scans. Both identity matches and locations can be added to the ignore list and you will be prompted to select a reason why.

Ignore Item Location: ignore the file or email message containing a match. Select the result, choose Ignore, then choose This Item Location.

Identity finder result screenshot

Ignore Identity Match: ignore the specific finding (like an example credit card number). Select the result, choose Ignore, then choose This Identity Match.

identity finder screenshot


identity finder icon

 

Shred– permanently delete the files containing PII securely if the files are no longer needed.

Warning: Files removed with the Shred action are unrecoverable. Be sure the files you shred are no longer needed. If you are unsure about whether a file should be kept, contact your department’s Information Security Liaison.


identity finder icon

Scrub– removes PII from a file while keeping the rest of the data intact. This should be used when the PII is no longer needed but the document itself must be kept. Note: email messages, attachments, PDF files and files with .zip archives cannot be scrubbed.


Warning: Using this option will replace every character of PII with an X and cannot be undone. If you are unsure if the information should be kept, contact your department’s Information Security Liaison.

Step 4

For any files that are needed and the identifying information must be kept, determine if the files can be moved to a more secure location such as a department file share.

If the file cannot be moved, do not take any action with Identity Finder. Instead:

  1. Validate that your PC/Mac is encrypted
  2. The collection/machine must be reported to University IT