GDPR celebrates its first birthday

On the 25th May 2018 the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) came into effect, changing the way businesses store and use personal data.

If you’re a business owner, you’ll no doubt remember the commotion; in fact, GDPR was Googled more than Beyoncé and Kim Kardashian during May 2018!

Despite all this, GDPR’s internet fame was short-lived, as related searches tailed off after it came into effect. However, that doesn’t mean that we should assume GDPR is yesterday’s news – one year on, there are still companies who are not fully GDPR compliant, perhaps without knowing.

Recent research has shown that more than 95,000 complaints were made to national data protection watchdogs in the EU in the eight months since GDPR came into effect. The European Data Protection Board revealed that the majority of complaints were in regard to telemarketing, email marketing and CCTV video surveillance.

Why you should still be concerned about GDPR compliance

An increasing number of consumers are becoming increasingly aware of their rights when it comes to the storage and use of their personal data, so it’s essential that, as a business, you don’t get caught out – if you do, you could be facing a €20 million fine or 4% of a firm’s global revenue if that is greater.

However, every business is different and there is no ‘silver bullet’ that will solve the problem of data compliance for everyone. Here at Enhanced, we are an award-winning provider of secure business technology and offer a range of services and systems that will help ensure you remain compliant with GDPR.

How can we help

Whilst we can’t help you make your CCTV system more GDPR compliant, we can help ensure your CRM system complements your compliance strategy when it comes to telemarketing and e-mail marketing activity.

Our SugarCRM system comes equipped with a Data Privacy module that allows you to record and track all types of data requests from your contacts, provides opt-out links as standard and permits you to mark fields as PII (personally identifiable information) so that they’re permanently erased if requested by the customer.

If you would like to discuss your business technology requirements with regards to GDPR, please contact Philippa Grover, Solutions Consultant on 01202 308000 or email her here.