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GeaSpeak

The role of confidential information in translation

By GeaSpeak Team | 2020-07-09
the-role-of-confidential-information-in-translation

To better understand the role of confidential information in translation, we must first talk about the importance of early access to applications.

Today, software and applications are launched to a global market and, thus, they need to be multilingual. What does this mean? To provide the best user experience, most of these products are localized in several languages.

However, during the localization process, the translator might face the perilous task of translating without context, especially, when it comes to translating the user interface.

Words such as “View” are difficult to translate without a context. How can we tell whether it is a call to action button, a button that is part of the interface or a notification? “Ver” and “Vista” are two valid options if you localize the text into Spanish, and the choice between them would depend on the context.

Now, you may wonder: why would we not know the context if we know what application we are dealing with? The answer is very straightforward. If the application or software has not yet been released, access to that product or service is confidential. This means that only the personnel who were duly selected and who have implemented the appropriate security measures can access the application and the confidential information.

One of the problems lies in that companies are very careful when granting this type of access. And although confidentiality agreements exist and are increasingly more stringent, many companies prefer to avoid the disclosure of their intellectual property as much as possible.

And they have very good reasons for this! Nobody wants to appear in the news this way:

Ex-Google engineer accused of stealing self-driving car trade secrets before joining Uber

Japanese executives charged in I.B.M. theft case

Oracle admits spying on Microsoft allies

That is why today, if we do not have exclusive access to an application before its launch, we must access it through secured and private platforms that allow localization and development teams to communicate and solve the unknowns that arise during the process of localization without compromising the security of the intellectual property.

But the reality is that we live in a world in which the new currency is information, and corporate espionage is a latent possibility.

Some security measures

For the reasons mentioned above, we must ensure to meet certain guidelines when working with confidential information and to offer the security that our client needs:

  • Work from a secured remote location.
  • Have a private network to which unauthorized devices do not have access.
  • Do not share files using unauthorized applications.
  • Update passwords frequently.
  • Never disable the firewall.
  • Avoid using the work computer for personal purposes.

If the corresponding security measures are implemented, companies will likely provide that much-needed access, and we can offer a higher quality localization service.