In today’s digital age, protecting personal data is a critical task for organizations of all sizes. With the increasingly complex nature of online interactions, compliance and privacy regulations, privacy compliance has become an ever-evolving challenge. To stay ahead of this challenge, organizations must be proactive in their approach to privacy management and take advantage of tools that can help them manage their entire privacy program and identify and manage privacy risk.
Privacy compliance is a necessity for any organization that handles personal data. It involves understanding and adhering to all applicable laws and regulations, such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA).
Ensuring compliance with privacy laws can be overwhelming. As new laws are introduced and take effect, organizations are faced with the challenge of staying up to date on the latest privacy requirements while ensuring personal data is protected in accordance with applicable privacy laws. To help manage this burden, many organizations have turned to privacy tools that can provide a centralized location for tracking all applicable laws by quickly alerting them when changes occur or when new laws are enacted. These tools can be invaluable in helping organizations stay compliant while also ensuring they are taking the necessary steps to protect personal data.
Although the use of a privacy tool is not mandatory for managing a privacy program, its use, whether it is by automated or manual means, makes it easier for those tasked with operational privacy responsibilities. Privacy tools can be an important mechanism to assist an organization with managing privacy compliance. These tools provide an efficient way to monitor privacy and compliance laws related to personal data. They range from simple software solutions that allow for easy tracking of changes in laws, regulations and standards to more complex systems designed for comprehensive management of all aspects of a company’s privacy program.
Some popular types of privacy tools include automated monitoring systems, risk assessment and analysis tools, policy management platforms, consent management solutions, data mapping software and encryption technologies. With these powerful resources at their disposal, organizations can confidently navigate the complexities of today’s changing regulatory environment while providing customers with peace of mind that their individual privacy rights are being supported.
For organizations just starting out on their privacy compliance journey but lacking sufficient people, technology or budget, a complex end-to-end privacy management tool may not be the best initial financial spend. Privacy tool investment should take place only after an organization understands its privacy gaps and has an approach to close those gaps. Privacy tools should support an organization’s strategic vision, not drive the vision. Until organizations have that initial understanding of where they are, what their gaps are and how they are going to remediate those gaps, upfront privacy investment should be put on hold.
However, that does not mean there are not tools available to assist in this initial phase. In addition to cost-based privacy tools, there are many free tools that can help an organization understand their legal privacy gaps. ISACA’s new privacy lookup tool is a great starting point to initially understand which privacy laws apply to your organization and what steps must be taken to comply. As an organization’s privacy program matures, this tool can then be used proactively to advise you of changes or new laws being enacted that your organization must comply with.
Privacy tools such as ISACA’s Privacy Regulatory Lookup Tool allow businesses to access important privacy laws from one centralized location. This can save a tremendous amount of time when it comes to understanding the articles and principles associated with each country or state’s data privacy regulation. This tool also provides guidance on terms and definitions and allows users to compare multiple privacy laws in one location. It is comprehensive enough to cover key privacy laws but not exhaustive where it covers all 50-plus global and state privacy laws. This focus on initially just including the most common privacy laws helps reduce complexity and privacy overload for those who may be newer to the privacy field.
Lastly, another of the key areas that may be useful for users of the tool is the ability to search on key terminology and display articles or principles related to that phrase, including the corresponding privacy legislation. This functionality is useful as not all privacy terminology is the same. A data processor in GDPR may be called something different in another country’s legislation—for example, in China’s Personal Information Protection Law (PIPL), a data processor could be called an “entrusted party.”
Overall, using a centralized tool to assist in monitoring global and local privacy laws is a key sign of a maturing privacy program that proactively monitors, informs and communicates these changes to the organizational privacy community. Having a tool that does not require you to sign up to multiple newsletters and will grow as your privacy program grows is key to being proactive in privacy compliance.
Editor’s note: Find more privacy resources from ISACA here.