Systems and methods for quantifying file access risk exposure by an endpoint in a network environment

Abstract

Systems, devices, and methods are discussed for identifying possible improper file accesses by an endpoint device. In some cases an agent is placed on each system to be surveilled that records the absolute paths for each file accessed for each user. This information may be accumulated and sent to a central server or computer for analysis of all such file accesses on a user basis. In some cases, a file access tree is created, and in some implementations be pruned of branches and leaves if deemed to be duplicates or very similar to other branched and leaves via a Levenshtein distance threshold. The resulting tree's edges may be scaled in particular implementations based on the deviation of a user's file accesses from their sphere of permissions. A variance metric may be computed from the final tree's form to capture the user's access patterns.