Security Vulnerabilities

#Security! Of course, security is # 10 on our list of the "Top 10 Dysfunctions of #Spreadsheets”.👇

A client of ours once said “manage risk and all else takes care of itself.” That stuck with me all these years, and I hope it helps encourage you too! Security might seem like a bit of a boring topic at first glance, but with a few simple changes, you’ll be better than most and dramatically reduce the risk of a significant blunder. ‼️

Spreadsheets will give you and your team extraordinary flexibility, and loads of hard-to-beat features (I personally love the speed of dragging to "fill down”) ⬇️ … but they’ll also give you ample opportunity to make a #securityBlunder. ⛔️

I’d go so far as to say that #spreadsheets tend toward #insecurity. Even a fully locked down Excel doc with a password can lead to oversharing — where does that password go, in a note or email? How does it get shared to others? What happens when a teammate leaves the company? Does it get revoked or cycled? 🤔

Beyond simple mistakes and blunders, you may also hit the limits of what spreadsheets can give you.

Let’s work biggest to smallest: folders, files, tabs, rows, cells. 📂

#Sharepoint, #GoogleDrive and #Dropbox will certainly give you a nice method to control who can see or edit across an entire folder and cascade that permission set into the files. You’ll have single sign on, which is quite solid and convenient. ✅

You may hit limits, however, locking down specific tabs, rows or cells.

For example, you build a simple sales quote / pricing tool in Google Sheets that takes on some more life over the years. Perhaps you want to start differentiating commission percentages for your sales staff, based on seniority. You’ll want to implement security at the record/row level, and that may go beyond the limits of your platform.

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Let's think through your options:

1.In a #spreadsheet, plan out your structure of folders and files. Make a visual map in #Miro or #LucidChart and think through who should see what.

And if you have multiple sheets shared with different sales reps, plan out your process for manually copying changes from one sheet to another.

Also do a bit of thinking and experimenting with #externalFileReferences and lookups. Create two logins for yourself so you can go in as the full access architect, and then also login separately (you can use two different browsers), to test it out as a limited end user. 👩‍💻

2.In a #RapidApp development environment such as #Claris #FileMaker, you’ll be able to translate your visual security map into a full fledged secure application. 🔐

Again, be sure to test it out thoroughly. Create two logins and then try to find your way into sensitive information. Better yet, ask a friend or two to hunt around and ensure that they can’t find a back door.

Thank you!