OneTrust acquires DocuVision to automatically find and redact sensitive data in documents

OneTrust, the heavily funded data privacy, governance, and compliance company, has acquired DocuVision, an AI-powered platform that companies use to find and redact sensitive data in large volumes of documents and emails. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

The acquisition represents the first notable activity from Atlanta, Georgia-based OneTrust since its $300 million raise a few months back, which valued the company at more than $5 billion.

Businesses have fallen under increasing scrutiny and pressure to comply with a growing array of data privacy regulations including GDPR in Europe and CCPA in California, while any enterprise wishing to be taken seriously by potential clients must demonstrate their ability to safeguard all manner of private and confidential information.

Founded in 2016, OneTrust is one of many startups that have emerged to capitalize on the demand for data privacy tools, both for regulatory compliance and customer peace-of-mind. The company offers a self-assessment tool that helps its customers see how close they are to complying with legal frameworks such as GDPR, while it also offers “data mapping” to show companies how data is flowing through the organization and across borders. Throw into the mix a suite of products for marketers such as cookie compliance, consent management, and breach response tools, and it’s clear that OneTrust has been bolstering its arsenal of automated smarts to cater to the burgeoning $80 billion data privacy market.

Above: OneTrust “readiness” dashboard

Founded out of Berkeley, California, in 2019, Docuvision serves companies with tools to automatically discover personally identifiable information (PII), such as names, social security numbers, and potential passwords. With Redacted.ai, Docuvision’s main product, companies can automatically redact more than 100 different types of personal information, including signatures, logos, and images of faces — and this is what OneTrust is essentially buying DocuVision for.

Alongside the acquisition news, OneTrust announced that it has launched a new integrated product that builds on its existing capabilities called OneTrust Data Redaction, which is aimed at privacy, legal, and information security departments. The company said that it has created the “first fully automated data subject rights (DSAR) workflow including intake, ID verification, discovery, redaction, and secure response,” according to a press release.

What this means is that a customer that requests access to their data under a right-of-access stipulation can do so more quickly, as the business can safeguard other non-relevant PII that’s contained in the document by automatically redacting it rather than manually poring over pages of text. It also helps enterprises support any number of use cases, such as litigation, freedom of information (FOIA) requests, or merger and acquisition disclosures. Redacted.ai also has an API, which means it can be integrated into third-party cloud platforms such as AWS, OneDrive, SharePoint, Dropbox, and Google Drive.

A number of startups have taken an API-based approach to monetizing data privacy, including Skyflow which recently raised $17.5 million to develop its cloud-native “data privacy vault” that enables developers to build applications and workflows without having to worry about data privacy themselves. Meanwhile, Ubiq Security has created an API-based platform for developers to integrate encryption into their apps.