Patent ID: 7930756

Claim:
A computer-implemented method comprising: in response to a request from a requestor, obtaining security information from a header of a secure electronic file, the security information including at least encryption structure information, access rules to control access to the secure electronic file, user groups that are authorized to access the secure electronic file, and secrets used to decrypt the secure electronic file, wherein the secrets are associated with the user groups and security clearance levels authorized to access the secure electronic file, and wherein the access rules limit the availability of the secrets to requestors that: are members of a user group that is authorized to access the secure electronic file; and possess a security clearance level authorized to access the secure electronic file, wherein the security clearance level is associated with a content type and a confidentiality level of the secure electronic file; attempting to decrypt, by a computing device, at least secure data of the secure electronic file for access by the requestor based on the encryption structure information, the access rules, the user groups, and the secrets; and unsecuring, by the computing device, the secure data for access by the requestor in response to determining that at least the secure data of the secure electronic file is successfully decrypted.