At no stage in the history of mankind has there been more data held on record for each and every one of us. And with the proliferation of data, there’s a commensurate responsibility for organizations to protect it.
But despite a clear-cut need for data privacy, many organizations struggle to live up to their responsibilities, and data breaches are on the rise, according to the Identity Theft Resource Center. The Center claims that data breaches are currently growing at a rate of over 20%. Not all of these breaches, of course, will be as a result of malicious hacking – they can also come about as a result of lax security, or just plain-old human error.
Part of the increase in data breaches also results from rapid changes to the way that data is created and stored. Users can now transmit large amounts of data quickly and easily via the internet – or through portable storage devices.
This carries an inherent chance that data confidentiality will be placed at risk, hence the need for data privacy training to protect the business. Without it, the organization is open to a wide range of threats. Once it becomes public knowledge that private client information has been hacked, you can find yourself losing customers, experiencing negative media attention, suffering from reputational damage. And on top of this, there may be financial penalties imposed by the relevant Regulator or legal regime you operate under.
To counter this, here are four essential steps for any organization that’s serious about data privacy compliance:
1. Data Protection Policy
You need to ensure that you have a robust in-house company data protection policy for your organization. This should fully comply with current data protection legislation, but it should also be updated on a regular basis in response to the changing legislative and regulatory environment. It needs to exist as a comprehensive compliance policy document for your organization, capable of reflecting the changing world in which it operates.
2. Responsive to Data Breaches
Even the most professional and competent companies can be subject to a data breach. What defines the better companies, however, is how they respond to it. It’s essential, therefore, that you have a clearly defined procedure for reporting and investigating actual or suspected data breaches. Having such an effective reporting system in place should be seen as a badge of honor rather than an admission of failure.
3. Learn from Mistakes and Adapt
If a data breach occurs in your organization, it’s really important that you learn from it. Ultimately, this is your best available tool for pre-empting further problems down the line. The ability to learn from mistakes is a defining feature of many of the most efficient organizations when it comes to data protection. And in the case of a breach, what has been learned should be incorporated in your formal data protection policy.
4. Data Privacy Training
Data security is an issue that impacts on every one of your employees. Keeping them up-to-date with the latest company procedures and regulatory legislation around Compliance requires regular and effective data privacy training. Ultimately, your people are your greatest barrier against data breaches, so make sure they receive the level of training they require to ensure the integrity of customer data. This can be made more interesting and engaging by using a combination of training types, including eLearning, mobile learning, gamification and classroom learning.
Compliance Training Solutions
At Interactive Services, we specialize in developing data privacy training and other compliance training programs.
If you’d like to know more about what we can do for your organization in this area, then contact us today.