Who can still open your files after they've left?

Your access to company files may remain open after you leave an organization.

A private dinner event hosted by The Register and LucidLink in London on November 24, 2026, will bring together senior technology, infrastructure, and data leaders. The discussion, held under the Chatham House Rule, aims to address the challenges of managing file access and permissions after employees leave an organization. Key issues to be explored include the proliferation of file copies across various devices and cloud services, the existence of unmanaged or shadow IT solutions, and the difficulty in revoking access from all locations. The event will also cover the growing problem of unstructured data, duplicate storage, and strategies for regaining control over data access without discarding existing storage and governance infrastructure. Alan Marshall, Strategic Director, EMEA at LucidLink, will participate in the roundtable discussion.

The core problem highlighted is the difficulty in ensuring comprehensive data access revocation for departing employees, leading to potential security vulnerabilities. This issue stems from the decentralized nature of modern data storage, where files reside not only on central servers but also in sync clients, multiple laptops, and various cloud-based shares, each with its own set of permissions. The event's focus on "shares nobody closed" and unapproved team-built tools suggests a widespread, unaddressed challenge in IT governance and endpoint management.

The discussion implies a market need for solutions that provide centralized, granular control over file access and permissions across all data locations, including legacy systems and shadow IT. This could drive demand for more sophisticated data governance platforms, identity and access management tools, and potentially new approaches to data synchronization and storage management that prioritize security and auditability over simple accessibility.