Life after GDPR: Practical compliance tips

gdpr

Infosecurity Europe 2019 revealed that more than two-thirds of organisations are yet to comply with the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

The report, as stated in our previous article, also revealed a misconception about GDPR compliance. Businesses who have complied with GDPR perceive their compliance as a sign of absolute information security.

GDPR is created as a foundation for better data protection. It promotes privacy and information security on a relatively basic level. The fact that more than two-thirds of organisations aren’t in compliance is alarming, but so is the assumption that compliance means there is no need to take further action to strengthen information security.

Compliance itself is not a complex challenge to tackle. In fact, GDPR is formulated to help businesses protect their customers’ information at a fundamental level. These next few tips and tricks will help your business meet GDPR requirements right away.

Strengthen Your IT Infrastructure

Everything from the cloud ecosystem you use to the internal networking setup needs to be strengthened from a security standpoint. A lot of companies now hire service providers that offer IT support, Azure cloud services, and Office 365 support to help strengthen their IT systems better.

When it comes to IT support and cybersecurity, Edinburgh is one of the leading cities. Texaport, a leading IT support company in Edinburgh, has been aiding businesses of different scales as part of a bigger attempt to comply with GDPR. The company services Edinburgh business entities as well as companies from different parts of the country.

Laying a strong and secure foundation is the beginning. It makes the rest of the tasks you have to complete easier to manage since you no longer have to worry about security on an infrastructure level. This includes setting up sufficient encryption and security measures for maximum protection.

Identify Purpose

Data collection is not something to be taken lightly. Before you begin collecting customers’ information, you have to understand the purpose of data collection in greater detail. This is one of the requirements of GDPR, and it is put in place for good reasons.

Identifying the purpose of collecting customer information allows you to carefully select which personal data to collect while determining the purpose of storing individual data. It is a seamless process that also leads to a more comprehensive data collection strategy since it allows you to determine the right way to store sensitive information.

While identifying the purpose of data collection, you can also redefine your information security policies. Who has access to customer information? How is the information stored? Are there sufficient backup and security measures in place? These are the questions you can answer along the way.

Document Data Collection

Logging is a big part of GDPR compliance. Once again, having a strong and capable IT infrastructure, supported and maintained by experienced specialists helps make the process of complying with GDPR more manageable. A well-configured and well-maintained infrastructure will have the basic logging capabilities covered.

On a software or solution level, you can integrate a more capable logging mechanism. You need to document how data is collected, how it is stored, and how it is accessed and used. By covering these three levels of logging, you always have the ability to trace leaks or potential data breach to a specific source or runtime.

The next step is disclosing how data is stored. Both you and the customers – as well as stakeholders such as the EU commission – need to understand how personal details are stored and how they are managed through your information pipeline.

Update Your Privacy Policy

Next, you want to update your privacy policy to comply with GDPR’s requirements. This is part of the disclosure process mentioned earlier. You have to include in the privacy policy details like how personal data is collected and how personal details are used. More importantly, users need to agree to the new privacy policy before you begin collecting and storing personal information.

Consent is a big part of the GDPR requirements. Users must specifically agree to your terms and privacy policy before you can start collecting data. It is also important to provide users with the ability to withdraw their consent at any time, upon which you are required to purge all personal details and stop collecting more from those users.

Setting up policies is a step that needs to be followed by your preparedness to honour those policies. You need internal workflows that also comply with GDPR, particularly workflows related to data collection and purging. Paired with detailed logging, you can stop worrying about not being able to comply with the regulation in the event of a data breach.

Keep in mind that GDPR is more of a fundamental requirement than a security standard. After complying with the regulations, you also want to take active steps towards strengthening your systems. At this point, you can shift focus towards adding and improving security measures to better protect customers’ information.