With European Data Protection Day being marked at the end of January, Rob Price, UK Sales Consultant at Snow Software offers some best practices for organizations on securing data protection.
Price expands on these practices by telling Digital Journal how data protection and protection has changed and will continue to change throughout 2021. Price says that with information technology it is important that enterprises understand and evaluate their technology consumption.
Ideally, everyone responsible for using personal data has to follow strict rules called ‘data protection principles’. However, this is often not the case and this accounts for the growing need for regulation.
Digital Journal: How has data protection and protection changed in 2020?
Price: Changes to laws are generally slow processes. They often lack the agility to react to fast changing situations, incluidng the coronavirus pandemic. If we divide privacy and protection and focus on protection, then the information technology landscape is a vastly different place to this time last year. A lot of attention has been placed upon the pressures of a workforce suddenly forced to work from home or remote locations, and the information technology function has needed to adapt and drive programs for enabling this immediate requirement.
We have seen a large amount of change within the information technology landscape. Examples include emergency budget decisions, adoption of new enabling technologies and working practices.
This is a rate of change I do not believe has ever been witnessed before, and all this creates opportunities for threat actors. In turn this means that data protection has never been more important or challenging than information technology is now.
For company best practices, Price offers the following sound bites:
Do not lose sight of fundamentals of solid information technology practice
Ensure the minimum level of access to perform the required function
Keep an accurate inventory (software and hardware)
Keep everything up to date – Including awareness training for ALL employees.
DJ: Has this been enhanced by remote working?
Price: Remote working and communication has thrown open the doors of risk to organizational data, with endpoint protection significantly weakened, shadow information technology growing, employees having to find new ways of completing tasks whilst being distracted with life stuff All of this change makes information technology easier for the bad guys to make off with the lifeblood of a business.
DJ: How will things change in 2021?
Price: I believe that we will see a so-called ‘domino effect’ with adoption of regulations that match the intention of the GDPR across the world. This connects with the demands of the population refusing to accept the reckless business behaviours that are affecting their futures.
Do not underestimate the personal anguish involved in having to clean up the mess left behind when someone has stolen your identity and trashed your life.
