5 Steps for Data Risk Management to Comply With GDPR
GDPR has been in effect for over a year, and organisations today are not only looking at their immediate compliance needs, but they are also considering a holistic approach to data protection.
Data risk management is a catch-all term for lots of different facets of data from assessing it to data protection and is often part of a more general data governance programme. We’ve put together a list of 5 key steps you need to take to ensure compliance with GDPR when it comes to risk management:
Surveillance of your Data Assets
Most businesses aren’t aware of the full suite of data assets that have a GDPR compliance risk. It is prudent therefore to perform a survey of all data assets you hold in your organisation and document the details of them – name of data asset, owner, location and any other pertinent pieces of information.
Severity Modelling and Risk Assessments
While surveillance of your data assets can tell you some things about the data you hold, it may not provide any details about the content of that data. Risk assessments scans data assets to determine if they contain any Personally Identifiable Information (PII). In addition, severity modelling can be used to give a score for every risk identified based on its severity.
Classifying Data Risks Successfully
Being able to classify data risks will help in terms of the level of sensitivity that is required, and the type of protections that must be applied to data assets. For example, a data asset could be stored behind a firewall, encrypted or subject to limited access. This section of a data risk management strategy must include the procedures, processes and specifics of an organisation’s technology needs for data protection.
Managing Access Rights
It is worth bearing in mind that users within your organisation may process PII data differently and for different purposes. Access to those data sets may vary and some users may need different rights to access data than others. This incorporates policies and procedures to specify roles and describe access rights for each role.
IT Security Coordination and Risk Management
This can be a more challenging aspect of managing data risk and weaving it into more general IT security, data security and protection groups can prove to be a minefield if it is not managed correctly. Policies should be well defined and aligned to work well with the overall security strategy.
To find out more about data classification and how it can help your business or organisation, download a copy of our eGuide “The Ultimate guide to Data Governance and Risk Management”.
You can also watch our webinar to understand the benefits of employing automated solutions for discovering and analysing data to mitigate your business risks and optimise opportunities.