PCI Data Discovery Tool: How to Discover and Classify PCI Data for Compliance

In today’s payment-driven world, the risk of storing cardholder data in unmonitored systems is higher than ever.
Yet, most organizations don’t even know where their PCI data truly lives — across emails, cloud drives, file servers, or databases.

That’s where a PCI Data Discovery Tool becomes essential. It’s not just about ticking PCI DSS checkboxes — it’s about finding, classifying, and controlling sensitive payment and PII data before it leaks.

✨ Understanding PCI Data Discovery

PCI Data Discovery is the foundation of PCI DSS compliance.
It means systematically identifying where cardholder and authentication data resides, intentionally or accidentally — across your enterprise systems.

This includes:

• Primary Account Numbers (PANs)
• Cardholder names and expiration dates
• Sensitive Authentication Data (CVV2, Track data, PINs)

Strac helps uncover all of these across structured (databases, CSVs) and unstructured (emails, PDFs, images) locations.

Why it matters:
Most breaches occur when card data is stored in unexpected places — logs, Slack messages, screenshots, backups, or test environments.
PCI DSS requirement 3.1 explicitly requires limiting data retention and deleting unnecessary cardholder data.

With discovery, you gain visibility into where PCI data lives and can take action before auditors or attackers find it.

✨ What Makes a Great PCI Data Discovery Tool

A strong PCI Data Discovery Tool goes beyond regex pattern matching.
It combines deep scanning, intelligent context recognition, and automated remediation.

Key capabilities include:

1. Comprehensive scanning across SaaS, cloud, databases, and endpoints.
2. Luhn checksum validation to verify real PANs.
3. PCI PII data classification — detecting card data + PII like name, email, or address.
4. OCR on images and PDFs to find card numbers in screenshots or scanned receipts.
5. Real-time alerts when new PCI data appears in unauthorized apps or folders.
6. Remediation workflows (mask, delete, revoke access).

A complete PCI Data Discovery Tool doesn’t just tell you what is wrong — it enables you to fix it.

How PCI PII Data Classification Strengthens PCI Compliance

PCI PII Data Classification extends discovery by identifying associated personal identifiers that amplify compliance and breach risk.
For example, a file containing both a PAN and cardholder name is far riskier than a PAN alone.

Strac’s PCI classifiers automatically detect combinations like:

• PAN + Name
• PAN + Email
• PAN + Address or Zip Code
• PAN + Customer ID or Account Number

This contextual understanding helps prioritize risk and guide remediation.
It also strengthens your PCI DSS posture across Requirements 3 (Data Protection) and 12 (Ongoing Risk Management).

Learn how Strac classifies sensitive data →

Why Continuous PCI Data Discovery is Essential

PCI Data Discovery is not a one-time audit exercise — it’s an ongoing process.
Every new system integration, employee upload, or AI workflow can generate new cardholder data risks.

That’s why Strac performs real-time and historical scanning:

• Real-time: Detects when card data is uploaded to Slack, Google Drive, or Zendesk.
• Historical: Scans existing databases, S3 buckets, and email archives for residual PCI data.

Each discovery is classified, remediated, and logged for audit evidence.

Strac integrates natively via APIs — no network proxy needed — for Google Workspace, O365, AWS, Azure, Salesforce, and more.

Explore our PCI DSS Compliance page for a full overview.

✨ How PCI Data Discovery Helps Meet PCI DSS Requirements (3.1, 3.2, 9, and 12)

The PCI Data Discovery process directly maps to several key PCI DSS requirements that govern how cardholder data should be identified, protected, and monitored.

1. Requirement 3.1 – Limit Data Retention
   You must retain cardholder data only if necessary for legal or business reasons.
   • Strac’s PCI Data Discovery continuously scans your data stores and flags legacy card data that violates retention timelines.
   • You can instantly delete, redact, or quarantine that data and generate auditor-ready reports.
2. Requirement 3.2 – Do Not Store Sensitive Authentication Data (SAD)
   PCI strictly forbids storing full track data, CVV2, or PIN blocks post-authorization.
   • Strac detects such data — even hidden in logs, images, or chat files — and remediates automatically.
   • This ensures you never unknowingly violate PCI DSS retention rules.
3. Requirement 9 – Restrict Physical and Logical Access
   Even if cardholder data is found, it must be accessible only to authorized personnel.
   • Strac’s discovery results link directly to file ownership and sharing metadata.
   • You can identify “who has access” and revoke public or external sharing with one click.
4. Requirement 12 – Maintain a Security Policy and Continuous Monitoring
   PCI DSS 12 mandates that you implement and maintain policies for ongoing monitoring of cardholder data.
   • Strac’s real-time scanning and historical PCI Data Discovery create an always-on compliance fabric, with automated alerts and logs integrated into your policy controls.

For deeper mapping, see Strac’s PCI DSS Compliance Overview →

✨ How Strac Automates PCI Data Discovery, Classification, and Remediation

Strac’s unified Data Discovery + DLP + DSPM platform is purpose-built for PCI, HIPAA, and GDPR compliance.

Here’s how it works:

1. Discover: Scans every file, message, and database to detect cardholder data.
2. Classify: Labels it as PCI, PII, or mixed sensitivity.
3. Remediate:
   • Mask or redact PCI data in SaaS apps.
   • Remove public or external sharing on cloud drives.
   • Quarantine files with unencrypted card data.
4. Alert: Sends notifications via Slack, Teams, or email.
5. Audit: Generates reports for PCI DSS Assessors (QSAs).

You can see it in action here: Strac PCI DSS Blog →

PCI Data Discovery Best Practices Checklist

1. Scan beyond your CDE. Card data often leaks into shared drives or SaaS apps.
2. Classify both PCI and PII data. They’re intertwined in real-world workflows.
3. Remediate fast. Don’t just report — remove, mask, or quarantine sensitive data.
4. Integrate discovery with DLP. Ensure continuous protection, not just post-discovery.
5. Automate evidence. QSAs love well-documented discovery and remediation logs.

Final Thoughts

PCI Data Discovery is more than compliance — it’s visibility and control.
You can’t protect what you can’t see, and PCI audits are smoother when you have automated discovery, classification, and remediation already built in.

With Strac, organizations can find, classify, and remediate PCI data — across any SaaS, Cloud, or Endpoint — within hours.
That’s how modern compliance and security teams stay PCI-ready year-round.

Spicy FAQs

What is the difference between PCI Data Discovery and PCI DLP?

PCI Data Discovery finds where your cardholder data lives.
PCI DLP (Data Loss Prevention) prevents it from leaking.
With Strac, both are unified — you can detect and block in real time.

How can I manually perform PCI Data Discovery without tools?

You can use basic regex searches and scripts to detect 13–19-digit numbers and run Luhn checks.
However, this manual approach fails across PDFs, images, SaaS, and cloud systems.
Automated tools like Strac’s PCI Data Discovery cover those blind spots.

Does PCI DSS require Data Discovery?

Yes — PCI DSS v4.0 mandates that you identify and secure all stored cardholder data (Req. 3.1).
Discovery tools provide the evidence QSAs expect for audit readiness.

Can PCI Data Discovery Tools detect PII too?

Absolutely. The best ones — like Strac — include PCI PII Data Classification, letting you detect personal info that amplifies breach impact and compliance risk.

How often should PCI Data Discovery scans run?

Best practice is continuous or daily scanning on high-risk systems and monthly across all others.
Strac automates both with real-time SaaS scanning and scheduled cloud sweeps.