How to Prevent Data Theft by Departing Employees: 7 Best Practices

What walks out the door with an employee on their last day? Sometimes, it is more than just a personal laptop and a goodbye. It may be your most sensitive data. It may be inadvertent — but often it’s deliberate, and the consequences can be severe. From loss of intellectual property and competitive advantage to regulatory penalties and reputational damage, employee data theft can cost you a lot.

In this article, we examine how departing employees steal data, the most common warning signs of data theft, and how organizations can detect and stop it. 

Key takeaways

• Implementing a zero trust approach, controlling access privileges, and preparing a robust incident response plan can reduce the risk of data theft.
• More than one in four employees steal data when leaving, often during the final days of employment.
• Lack of visibility into how employees access, copy, or transfer data creates blind spots and increases the risk of data theft.
• Employees may steal data due to perceived ownership of IP, financial gain, desire for career advancement, revenge, or simple negligence.
• Unusual file access, USB usage, and cloud uploads are common indicators of employee data theft that can be detected with the monitoring tools like Syteca.

What are the risks of data theft by departing employees?

When an employee resigns, they usually move to a similar position at a company operating in the same industry — maybe even your direct competitor. They are expected to leave only with their experience and personal belongings, but some workers also take their employer’s valuable data with them.

When departing employees make off with sensitive data, the consequences rarely stop at the loss of a few files. Copying customer records, intellectual property, financial documents, or internal plans without authorization can cause business, legal, and reputational damage. 

Among the key negative outcomes your organization may face in case of data theft by a departing employee are:

• Fines and penalties for non-compliance. Sensitive financial data, medical data, and personal records are protected by various cybersecurity regulations and standards. If an employee steals this data, their employer can face external audits and costly fines for non-compliance.
• Confidentiality breaches. When a client signs a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) with an organization, they expect the details of their deal to be private. Yet a departing employee can disclose the details of an NDA to their new employer and break the trust of your clients.
• Loss of competitive advantage. Intellectual property (IP) is frequently stolen by departing employees. They can take with them designs, software code, and documents that they worked on to their next workplace. As a result, your competitor can discover and incorporate your trade secrets. Another possible scenario of intellectual property theft is the disruption of your work. This can happen if an employee steals and deletes project information before termination.
• Loss of clients. News on data and confidentiality breaches is a red flag for many customers, even if their personal information remains untouched and they are unaffected by a breach. Clients may lose faith in your organization and may start looking for another partner. 

As you can see, a departing employee can have a significant influence on an organization. Departing employees typically have strong motivation and the necessary knowledge to steal data. Let’s take a look at the key reasons behind departing employee data theft.

Why do employees steal data from a company?

Here are the key reasons for data theft by departing employees:

Feeling of ownership over IP. When an employee has worked on a product, model, or engineering process for a long time, they may view that intellectual property as something they helped create and, therefore, something they can take with them. 

A well-known example is Tesla’s case against former engineer Jay Li, whom Tesla accused of taking confidential files related to the Optimus robot project before leaving and then using that knowledge to help launch his own startup, Proception. Tesla claimed that the stolen information allowed the startup to achieve in months what had taken Tesla years of work and investment. 

Desire to secure a better position. When employees move to a direct competitor, they may believe that taking proprietary files, model data, design documents, or product know-how will strengthen their value in the new role. 

One recent example is xAI’s 2025 case against former engineer Xuechen Li, who was accused of absconding with trade-secret files tied to Grok (an AI assistant built by xAI) after accepting a job at OpenAI. xAI believes that the stolen material could help a direct rival improve competing AI products. 

Revenge on the employer. If an employee had a conflict with their employer before termination, they could use their credentials and knowledge of the organization for revenge.

In one example, a former Coupang employee allegedly exploited their access after leaving to get revenge, contributing to a massive leak that affected 33.7 million customer accounts. Coupang announced it would provide a compensation package to affected customers worth a total of 1.69 trillion KRW (~$1.18 billion). This case shows how the actions of a single former insider can lead to customer harm, regulatory scrutiny, public backlash, and enormous financial consequences. 

Personal financial gain. Instead of taking data to advance their own career directly, some insiders steal information because someone else is willing to pay for it. A notable example of employees stealing data for financial gain is the Rippling–Deel espionage case. 

In this incident, a former Rippling employee admitted to spying for rival Deel and passing internal information, including payroll strategy materials, expansion plans, marketing materials, and customer details. For Rippling, the impact was broader than file loss alone; it included competitive intelligence exposure, litigation expenses, executive distraction, and possible damage to customer confidence in how sensitive commercial information is protected.

Poor understanding of data security. Departing employees may unintentionally steal or damage data due to negligence, without any malicious intent. Some employees copy files to personal drives, keep credentials, or move work to personal accounts without fully understanding confidentiality obligations.

All these scenarios highlight the importance of safeguarding company data and the risks associated with departing employees. And, luckily, regardless of their motivation, departing employees usually leave digital traces of their insider activity. With the right cybersecurity software, you’ll be able to pick up those traces and stop misbehaving employees. Let’s examine some actions that could be indicators of data theft.

What are the indicators of data theft?

It’s important to investigate any suspicious activity to prevent data theft by employees. There are several indicators that may suggest your employee is stealing company data:

Plugging in unauthorized USB devices. Copying data to a USB flash drive or personal smartphone is a routine action that might not catch the attention of cybersecurity officers, especially if an organization has implemented a bring your own device policy. However, departing employees can use USB devices to steal data or attack your organization, so you must carefully control their use and create a list of approved devices. The use of unapproved USB drives or other external storage devices may indicate an attempt to copy confidential files and remove them from the organization without leaving an obvious digital trail.

Accessing sensitive files without a reason. As an employee gets closer to their termination date, they may begin to deviate from their usual behavior. For example, if an employee suddenly starts viewing or downloading confidential documents unrelated to their role, current projects, or usual responsibilities, it can be a warning sign. The reason for such behavior could be a desire to steal those files.

Using cloud storage services. Uploading corporate files to personal cloud storage platforms can also be a way to exfiltrate sensitive data. This behavior may include transferring documents to a personal Google Drive, Dropbox, or similar service. 

Sending emails with attachments to private accounts. Forwarding work documents to a personal email address is one of the most common ways employees take company data with them. This is particularly hazardous when the attachments contain client data, financial records, intellectual property, or internal reports.

Creating new accounts. The unexpected creation of new user accounts without approval may signal an attempt to maintain access after departure. Such accounts can be used as backdoors to return to company systems later without being noticed. If adding new user profiles is part of an employee’s responsibilities, verify that the employee creates only the required accounts.

Deleting files and backups. Employees who have worked in your organization for a long time know where you store critical data and backups. Deleting important files, folders, or backup copies may indicate an effort to damage business operations or conceal evidence of data theft. This kind of activity can severely affect recovery efforts and is often a strong sign of malicious intent rather than simple negligence.

Spotting these indicators early can help you prevent data theft by departing employees. 

How to prevent data theft by employees with Syteca

Syteca is an intelligent privileged access management (PAM) platform with built-in identity threat detection and response (ITDR) that can help you detect and stop malicious activity by departing employees.

1. Limit access to resources

Implement a zero trust approach that involves not trusting any user or device that tries to access sensitive resources. To get access, a user has to prove their identity and the validity of their device. After that, they can interact only with the data they need for their tasks. Such an approach reduces the attack surface in case a departing employee tries to steal data. With Syteca, you can:

• Limit user access with one-time passwords and manual access approval
• Granularly manage access rights by setting up role-based access control
• Verify a user’s identity with two-factor authentication
• Implement the just-in-time PAM approach to ensure that privileged users have access to critical data only for a valid reason, and only for a limited time.

2. Enhance activity monitoring for departing employees

If a terminated worker decides not to leave empty-handed, they usually start acting right before their termination. That’s why you need to practice employee computer monitoring. Syteca can monitor user activity in real time and record sessions. You can set up alerts for suspicious actions, get notifications each time a user activity triggers these alerts, and respond promptly if users do something suspicious.

3. Employ identity threat detection and response (ITDR)

Data theft prevention requires more than access controls and session monitoring. You also need the ability to respond before sensitive data leaves your organization. That is where identity threat detection and response (ITDR) becomes crucial.

Syteca helps you identify unusual user activity in real time with pre-set and configurable alerts for activity that may indicate data theft, policy violations, or other malicious actions. The platform also enables you to respond immediately to risky activity with automated actions such as session termination, killing a process, or sending warning messages to users. 

4. Implement USB device management

Copying data to a USB device is one of the easiest ways to steal information. Syteca’s USB device management solution helps prevent employees from copying files by detecting when a user connects a suspicious or unknown device, controlling access to it, and blocking the device if necessary. With Syteca, you’ll also be able to create a list of allowed USB devices and manually approve access.

5. Audit recent employee activity

A comprehensive audit is part of the offboarding procedure. It’s required to confirm that a terminated employee hasn’t violated any cybersecurity rules before departing the organization. Syteca enables you to review recorded user sessions and generate 30+ types of reports on user activity to help you conduct such an audit. If you detect malicious activity during an audit, you can export data in forensic format for further investigation.

6. Revoke privileges and credentials after termination

When employees leave, you must immediately delete their individual accounts, revoke access rights, and change credentials to prevent them from stealing data. Syteca accelerates these processes with its robust privileged access management capabilities, allowing you to reconfigure or fully revoke access in just a few clicks. Syteca’s privileged account discovery, in turn, can help you identify orphaned or backdoor accounts that could otherwise be overlooked during offboarding. 

In addition, Syteca enhances protection with password management tools that help you secure privileged credentials and reduce the risk of unauthorized use. By rotating passwords and controlling access to sensitive accounts, you can limit the risk that a departing employee will use known credentials to re-enter systems or access valuable data after termination. Syteca also allows you to grant access to your systems without exposing passwords to users, thereby preventing former employees from reusing known credentials.

7. Plan your response in advance

Even with strong preventive controls in place, organizations still need to be prepared for incidents. That’s why it’s important to have a clear response plan in place. A well-designed incident response plan can help your security team act quickly, contain the threat, and preserve evidence for investigation and compliance purposes. 

With Syteca, organizations can strengthen this process by detecting suspicious activity in real time, investigating incidents with comprehensive reports and tamper-proof session recordings, and responding to threats immediately.

Securing the exit process: start preventing data loss now

By the time employee data theft is discovered, the damage is often already done. The key is to prevent or detect risky behavior as early as possible. That means understanding how users interact with sensitive data, spotting deviations as they occur, preserving reliable evidence, and enforcing a real-time response.

Syteca helps organizations do exactly that. With Syteca, you can monitor user activity in real time, control access to sensitive systems and data, detect suspicious behavior early, and respond before an incident escalates. At the same time, Syteca provides tamper-proof audit trails and session recordings that preserve evidence for investigations, internal reviews, and compliance audits.