With so many users’ personal data to protect, data privacy becomes even a wider concern. SMEs and even large organizations have greater responsibility at hand and they are obliged to comply with the data privacy regulations like GDPR, CCPA, HIPAA, etc. Breaching these regulations come with hefty charges and penalties. It could even lead to loss of reputation. Although such organizations implement efficient data mapping software to help them know the flow of the data within an organization to enhance their data privacy protections and regulatory compliance, still they face some challenging data privacy issues as mentioned below.
Hoarding Data
Some companies retain data for analytic and marketing purposes. While the others just follow the “bad data culture”. In the past, organizations believed that more data is better. However, this is not the case now. Keeping a lot of data that does not benefit the company in the future in any way can open the gateways for data thieves and breaching of privacy regulations.
Therefore, it is always better to do a cost-benefit analysis and refine your data retention policy as required.
Outsourcing Responsibility
With plenty of other managerial responsibilities at hand, most large companies tend to outsource the data either offshore or domestic. However, this doesn’t mean that the company is not accountable anymore in case of a data privacy breach. Even if the outsourcing company fails to maintain the privacy and security of data, the company is going to be answerable for it. Which could lead to legal actions, penalties, and loss of goodwill.
Although it’s best to invest more resources in your own company to save the need for outsourcing. If it’s still necessary, companies should partner up with only those companies that take data privacy seriously and know the data privacy regulations in place.
Over-reliance on Risk Assessments
When companies tend to pass the generic ISO and PCI requirements, they don’t feel the need to put risk management controls in place. Little do they know is that these requirements just focus on whether specific controls are in place, and not how effective their controls actually are.
Deep analysis of risk management procedures and controls along with feedback can help a company keep an eye on how effective its controls are against malicious insiders or outsiders.
Not Prioritizing the Data
Different data require different levels of security. However, some organizations tend to get away with applying the same procedures and levels of protection for both less sensitive and highly sensitive data. This could lead to a loss of privacy and control of even the most confidential data.
Business managers need to prioritize the data according to its level of sensitivity and therefore, fund different levels of protection.
Not Knowing the Users and Flow of Data
This is the most common data privacy issue that companies face. It is pretty obvious that you can’t implement a risk management system and controls unless you know the nature, environment, users of data, and where it flows.
It is necessary to analyze data and document the findings, and the right software can also help you understand who uses data and how it moves through the organization’s network. This in return helps organizations keep their data secure and risk-free.
