Patent ID: 8464352

Claim:
A computer-implemented method of protecting against an unintentional release of sensitive data to an illegitimate or unintended entity, the method comprising: monitoring data entered by a user into a client application, wherein the monitoring comprises at least one of: determining whether an intended recipient of the data provided to the client application is globally trusted; and determining whether the intended recipient of the data provided to the client application is personally trusted; accessing a set of pattern generating functions; generating a set of string matching patterns by applying the set of pattern generating functions to sensitive data; determining, with a processor, that the data being entered into the client application matches one or more of the string matching patterns in the set of string matching patterns; and in response to determining that the data being entered into the client application matches one or more of the string matching patterns in the set of string matching patterns, performing at least one of: requesting that the user confirm a communication of the data; warning the user that communicating the data might result in an unintentional release of sensitive data to an illegitimate or unintended entity; preventing the client application from communicating the data; and logging a communication of the data by the client application.