The boeing company: simplifying a regional destruction program

Simplifying A Regional Destruction Program

Challenge:

Standardize and consolidate data destruction services and processes across multiple sites

Solution:

Iron Mountain Secure Shredding

Results:

• Establish a mature and compliant shredding program
• Know what to shred, when to shred it and where to place it
• Improve control over the flow of shredding costs and activities
• Support sustainability efforts: manage and govern in a responsible way

"We needed expert help to streamline and standardize our decentralized shredding operations so that we could securely destroy sensitive information while reducing related costs."

STEVE GUZEK, BOEING SENIOR MANAGER, SHARED SERVICES GROUP DATA PROTECTION

Aerospace companies operate in a complex, competitive marketplace. Concerns about privacy practices, regulations, the security of high-value intellectual property and cost containment make it critical to both reduce risk and drive efficiency throughout the enterprise.

For Boeing, the world’s largest aerospace company and leading manufacturer of commercial jetliners and defense, space and security systems, addressing these issues included a comprehensive evaluation of existing data destruction practices related to the regional destruction of sensitive information. For the most part, the company had relied on outsourced services from multiple vendors to take care of the majority of its information destruction needs, with some larger sites handling the effort in-house.

However, without a single, unified program to manage this function, it was difficult to know whether information was being destroyed as securely, consistently and efficiently as possible at all locations — or if the process instead introduced unnecessary risk and expense.

A Superior Service Model For Secure Shredding

After conducting an extensive selection process, Boeing chose Iron Mountain to be part of an enterprise-wide shredding program implementation. This included evaluating Iron Mountain’s plant security equipment and procedures, physical controls, vehicle security, chain of custody and management of personnel. The ability to satisfy strict regulatory and company-required security standards — plus a standard service model that would let the company manage the process with confidence across multiple regions —was critical to the selection process.

Boeing knew it could also depend on Iron Mountain as its central point of contact based on its past delivery of other services. The first step: assessing existing disposal practices at the company’s 20 East and Mid-West locations in North America.

Working with Boeing, Iron Mountain experts determined the best way to seamlessly comply with both internal policies and external regulations while delivering services for secure offsite and onsite shredding. Steve Guzek, the senior manager of Boeing’s Shared Services Group Data Protection, says a joint approach that incorporated Lean principles and process standardization was key: “Iron Mountain teamed with us to evaluate how we could meet our requirements, reduce costs and minimize security and compliance issues before we moved forward with the implementation.”

The standardization process that followed involved helping the company implement educational materials for the regions’1,200 onsite secure containers. This enabled the customer to give employees clear guidance as to which materials should be deposited in them for disposal, and when to do so.

It also called for setting up a single access view to simplify online account management of regional shredding activities. In addition, Iron Mountain provided support for regular tracking and consolidated reporting of usage and costs for paper and media destruction. The company gained the ability to monitor and report on its regional sustainability efforts, as well.

In just over a year, Iron Mountain has securely shredded nearly four-million pounds of sensitive materials from Boeing’s regional sites— all in an environmentally responsible way. Whether collecting and transporting them for consolidated offsite destruction, or performing secure mobile shredding on location, trained specialists follow strict chain-of-custody protocols. Supported by Iron Mountain’s InControl® solution, the specialists scan and capture the information needed to provide a complete audit trail, as well as data related to container volumes so that Boeing can spot trends and better match shredding schedules — and costs — with usage demands.

“Through Iron Mountain’s Secure Shredding Service, we know that our materials are being destroyed in a consistent, compliant and cost-effective manner,” says Guzek.

Results

With the help of Iron Mountain Secure Shredding, Boeing was able to:

• Establish a mature and fully compliant shredding program employing secure chain-of-custody practices to supply an auditable workflow that documents data destruction
• Know what to shred, when to shred and where to place material via a standard, single-vendor service model that improves oversight and employee awareness of information disposal policies and procedures
• Improve overall service management of the shredding process and costs by better alignment of service requirements with usage patterns
• Support environmental sustainability efforts by destroying sensitive information using responsible conservation practices

"We know that our materials are being destroyed in a consistent, compliant and cost-effective manner."