After the Facebook (now Meta) Cambridge Analytic scandal, regulators, business owners, and various stakeholders started understanding the importance of data privacy. Months after the scandal, the GDPR took effect on May 25, 2018, ushering in a new era of data privacy.
The European Union (EU) reformed the laws addressing personal data handling, providing EU residents control over their data regardless of where it was collected, stored, or processed and increasing an organization’s exposure to harsh penalties for non-compliance.
Since the GDPR, many other countries have introduced new data privacy laws, while others are reviewing their existing regulations.
Many tech companies have been required to pay much money either as a penalty fee or for settlement in court due to non-compliance with data privacy regulations. In light of this, this brief piece deeply delves into what data privacy compliance entails and how you can remain compliant, even as a startup.
What is Data Privacy Compliance?
Data privacy compliance is the widely accepted practice of ensuring that sensitive data collected by organizations and businesses are organized and managed to enable organizations to comply with enterprise business rules and legal requirements.
Establishing rules that specify how data protection is accomplished in your business in accordance and regulations is required for data protection compliance.
When you abide by the laws regulating how data of users, employees, or third parties is acquired, managed, and accessed, you can say that you comply with data privacy regulations. This means that an organization (also known as a data processor) must be meticulous when gathering, storing, and managing personal/sensitive data (the person or natural person whose data is to be protected).
Any information about a named or distinguishable natural person (referred to as the “Data Subject”) is referred to as “the Personal Data”.
A person who fits this description can be located, either directly or indirectly, using information such as a name, an identification number, location information, an online identifier, or characteristics related to that person’s physical, physiological, genetic, mental, economic, cultural, or social identity.
How organizations can benefit from complying with data privacy regulations
- Prevents data breaches.
- Improves and maintains brand value.
- Strengthens business growth.
- Builds customer trust and loyalty.
Setting up a systematic compliance effort for your business
Carve Out a Strategy
Many businesses lack a thorough, integrated, centralized, measurable approach to achieving data privacy compliance. To do this, the organization must have a high-level set of guidelines and documentation outlining the actions it will take with regard concerning (as defined by applicable laws).
There must be representation from all significant relevant stakeholders within the company.
Consult an attorney or a data protection guru.
There is a myriad of data privacy regulations, both national and international. This is why it is essential to consult a lawyer to understand the expectations. Afterward, you may employ a compliance officer and train other employees.
Keeping Proper Compliance Documentation
you should properly document plans and procedures for compliance. To store and manage all documents, reports, and data, various content management solutions, including Microsoft SharePoint, OneDrive for Business, and others, are available to store and manage all documents, reports, and data.
A dedicated person is ideal to manage document security and compliance. This makes it easier for subsequent employees who join the company later to understand the need for data privacy compliance and what needs to be done to achieve that.
Data Protection Policies and Procedures
An organization that complies with privacy laws offers administrative solid, technical, and physical security measures to guarantee the privacy, availability, and confidentiality of data.
This includes effective detection and prevention of unwanted or inappropriate access to data. To counter emerging threats, information security must be continuously reviewed, monitored, and updated. A tight set of guidelines and regulations must be in place when sharing data.
Developing a Response Strategy and Plan
You could do all of the above, and a breach could still occur. A data breach is a security violation in which sensitive, protected, or confidential data is copied, transmitted, viewed, stolen, or used by an individual unauthorized to do so.
Usually, the first thing to do is to inform the regulators. However, it is usually helpful to develop a response plan. This way, when things go wrong, you don’t lose customers and investors don’t walk out the door. A strong data breach response plan and The escalation process can lessen the impact of an incident. These strategies and the use of escalation channels should be covered in training for staff members in charge of breach response. As proactive preventive steps against a similar incident, the corrective activities in the reaction plan must be carried out and documented.
Conclusion
In the U.S. alone, there were 1139 total data breaches, with 174,402,528 records exposed in 2017, according to the Identity Theft Resource Center. The total costs to a company are staggering when potential regulatory fines are added to the dollar losses caused by a breach.
We live in a modern era of technological advancement. These advancements come with their perks as well as their banes. It is, for this reason, the need to protect personal data has become mission-critical across all industry sectors, bringing compliance challenges and opportunities to achieve a competitive advantage, ensure continued brand and safeguard customer trust.