Happy New Year to all of you and your Customers and of course their secured data. But will it be? Here we are with 5 months before the GDPR deadline

Happy New Year to all of you and your Customers and of course their secured data. But will it be? Here we are with 5 months before the GDPR deadline arrives and all the reports and surveys I see say we are in worse shape than had been claimed last year. What went wrong? Was it because few companies knew what would be required for GDPR, or perhaps they hoped they could side-step the issue? If companies are as unprepared as stated, we might be looking at the ‘Year of the Hacker’ with their ransom demands; or just the year of GDPR Fines and regulatory demands.

Technology, such as (Packaged Applications built for GDPR and other worldwide regulations) may be your last opportunity to meet GDPR Requirements head on and in time. Here are a few quotes I found insightful with a touch of humor at times, followed by more serious quotes from Elizabeth Denham (ICO) who delivered this ICO speech at a lecture for the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales in London on 17 January. She discussed the role of accountability in the GDPR, noting: " We’re all going to have to change how we think about data protection.”

First the older pre GDPR Quotes that in their own ways could have been written yesterday:

“It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that you'll do things differently.”  ― Warren Buffett

“Someone's sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.”  ― Warren Buffett

“I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by.”  ― Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt

“Sometimes the questions are complicated and the answers are simple.”  ― Dr. Seuss

“The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing.”  ― Walt Disney Company

Seriously, you may be putting your Customers, Company and reputations at risk. I am not trying to be the deliverer of bad news and certainly don’t wish to see this happen. In fact, I have dedicated myself and my company’s efforts to assist others in meeting their EU GDPR mandates and frustrating the Hackers. I am on your side and armed with well tested technology that can significantly assist you in actually having a trouble free 2018, even with just a few months before May of 2018.

A few more appropriate recent Quotes:

“Laws continue to be enacted, and the regulatory environment has become more complex due to unacceptable conduct remediation. Consequently, entities continue to be compelled to demonstrate compliance with legal mandates through documented assurance assessments.” 

― Robert E. Davis, Assuring IT Legal Compliance

“Compliance” is just a subset of “governance” and not the other way around.” 

― Pearl Zhu, Digitizing Boardroom: The Multifaceted Aspects of Digital Ready Boards

I really believe that we don't have to make a trade-off between security and privacy. I think technology gives us the ability to have both.

 ― John Poindexter

Some key Quotes from Elizabeth Denham of the ICO. I believe she is saying they mean business. Will your business count on you taking this seriously?

Information Commissioner talks GDPR and accountability in speech - from Elizabeth Denham

“When it comes to data protection, small businesses tend to be less well prepared. They have less to invest in getting it right. They don’t have compliance teams or data protection officers. But small organisations often process a lot of personal data, and the reputation and liability risks are just as real.”

“Accountability is at the centre of all this: of getting it right today, getting it right in May 2018, and getting it right beyond that.”

“Good practice tools that the ICO has championed for a long time - such as privacy impact assessments and privacy by design - are now legally required in certain circumstances.”

“Three quarters of us don’t trust businesses to do the right thing with our emails, phone numbers, preferences and bank details. I find that shocking.”

“Isn’t having customers’ trust a cornerstone to good business? Isn’t that intangible relationship with customers: loyalty, trust, repeat customers, something most companies want?”

“Last year we issued more than one million pounds in fines for breaches of the Data Protection Act, so it’s not a power we’re afraid to use.” 

“If a business can’t show that good data protection is a cornerstone of their practices, they’re leaving themselves open to a fine or other enforcement action that could damage bank balance or business reputation.”

“Having the right mindset towards data protection helps to future proof a business. It will put it in the right place to keep up with legislation.” 

“I want organisations to think to themselves: ‘we base our online user experience around what consumers want. We shape our products and services around what consumers want. We need to shape our data protection approach around what consumers expect’.” 

“We’re all going to have to change how we think about data protection.”

The quote that stands out the most to me (“Accountability is at the centre of all this: of getting it right today, getting it right in May 2018, and getting it right beyond that.”)

Now is the time to be accountable, May is when you must legally be prepared for audits and to show plans to protect customer’s data from Hackers; but it doesn’t stop there! This will be an ongoing obligation that must be abided by, even on a minute by minute basis.  As new data streams into an organization a company needs to strive to have a process that protects customer’s data with as close to zero latency as possible, not just on May 25, 2018.

We can be there now and throughout you GDPR process. Or we can charge in, like the Calvary, and encrypt much of your Customer’s personnel information just days before regulators appearance at your door step.

Yes, we really can in hours or a few days protect vast volumes of your data. However, BigDataRevealed will need greater advance notice in order to discover Indirect Identifiers and provide functionality to process a Citizen’s requests ‘To Be Forgotten’ also known as the ‘Right of Erasure’. We have solutions that will speed you on your way to GDPR compliancy, but don’t expect leniency from regulators if you haven’t taken these initial steps.

All we ask is for 3-5 days to prove our worth in assisting you in securing and protecting your Customer’s and Company’s Personal data and letting you decide if you want to purchase an annual subscription for 5 tenths of one percent of the starting GDPR fine. Limit your risks of project overruns and more importantly timeliness, and be many steps closer to GDPR Compliancy!

Now, not only available for Hadoop, BigDataRevealed now offers its Amazon AWS S3 release!

For Product info reach us [email protected]  / 847.440.4439 or for Services/Training at [email protected] Dennis James 832.532.4056 x1007