It’s Time for Privacy Pros to Make a Strategic Shift
The importance of effective data privacy can no longer be ignored.
Read NowBoth data privacy and data security fall under the data management umbrella. Even though they are two separate processes, there are some overlaps in their roles.
Privacy and security are both geared toward keeping your organization’s sensitive information safe from misuse and unauthorized access. The former does it by forcing you to evaluate what information you can and should store, while the latter does so with technical and legislative safeguards.
What risks? Data breaches, identity theft, and unauthorized data exposure. All of these can lead to penalties, especially if it’s personal information of consumers at stake.
Data security for reducing risks sounds logical, but how does data privacy help? One of the core principles underpinning data privacy guidelines is data minimization.
According to this principle, you must only collect information that you need and nothing more, which means you’ll have less to store and protect. Thus, even if there is a data breach, you’ve limited the amount of consumer information that threat actors can steal from you.
You must have heard of the GDPR. It—along with other regulations issued by various states, such as California’s CCPA—outlines how you should collect and protect personal data. Drafting a strong privacy and security framework for your business helps you stay compliant with these laws.
Any relationship—even a business relationship—is built on trust. Would you trust a friend after they brought random strangers into your house and one of them stole your wallet?
Probably not, right? So why expect customers to trust you if you can’t keep their sensitive data safe?
On the other hand, if you can keep their data from prying eyes and keep it safe in accordance with their consent, they will be more likely to do business with you.
While data privacy laws do provide guidance, you may want to consider building an internal privacy policy for your business data.
There are several elements that make a good data privacy program. Here are some best practices to help you create one:
To protect something, you first need to know of its existence and location. That’s why you need to know what data you have, how and where it’s stored, and how you handle it. Once you’ve discovered your data, it should be classified as well.
Data classification is when you rate it in order of sensitivity and importance. Sensitive personal data needs more protection than other types.
Finally, you need to decide how often you carry out the inventorying process. This is something you must do periodically because you’re continuously collecting data and adding it to your systems.
We know data is power, and with great power comes great responsibility. The more you collect, the more you need to manage and protect. That’s why data privacy best practices recommend minimizing your data collection.
Only collect what you absolutely need. This isn’t just great for privacy, but it also reduces your risk. You can’t accidentally expose data in a breach if you aren’t processing that data in the first place.
Consent is a major part of data privacy. For valid consent, the consumer must know what you’re collecting and how it’ll be used, among other information. Clear privacy notices inform them of your intent and the purpose of collection.
This notice should ideally offer the customer the option to opt out of data collection altogether and also allow them to decide what they’re comfortable sharing. The more power you give your customers over their data, the more they will trust you.
When you invest in data privacy—true and comprehensive data privacy—you’ll find compliance can involve tedious and time-consuming work.
Platforms like Osano make managing data and your customers’ privacy so much easier. You can automate data mapping, consent management, data subject access request (DSAR) processes, privacy impact assessments (PIA), and so much more.
They also manage compliance for you. If your business is spread across multiple states or countries, you must comply with each jurisdiction's regulations by protecting data. An automated platform will be able to do that for you.
Intrigued? Find out more about what our data privacy management platform can do for you.
Curious about what benefits privacy management can bring to your business? Download the ebook and find out today.
Download NowOsano is used by the world's most innovative and forward-thinking companies to easily manage and monitor their privacy compliance.
With Osano, building, managing, and scaling your privacy program becomes simple. Schedule a demo or try a free 30-day trial today.