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J anuary 28 is Data Privacy Day, an international event with a mission to empower individuals about their data privacy rights and encourage businesses to respect privacy, safeguard data and enable trust. Many businesses collect sensitive or confidential personal data from their customers as part of everyday business operations. It’s important for small business owners to recognize the importance of data privacy, keep data safe from hackers and promote safe, responsible management of customer data.
In light of Data Privacy Day, we’d like to offer a few tips for how business owners can honor their commitment to keeping their customers’ privacy safe, with best practices and tools for data security and data privacy.
Data privacy has become even more essential during the events of the last year, as millions of workers have started working from home in new ways, sometimes using personal devices for work purposes. Businesses need to be prepared to adjust their protocols for information security and data privacy in a remote world.
The health implications of the pandemic have also had an effect on data privacy. Contact tracing and medical records have become front and center for fighting the pandemic from a public health perspective, while needing to strike a balance with preserving individuals’ rights to their privacy as medical patients. The World Health Organization (WHO) put out a statement in November 2020 saying that any data collection, data usage or data processing that is part of fighting COVID-19 should be “rooted in human rights and implemented with due regard to applicable international law, data protection and privacy principles.”
Clearly, data privacy is top of mind. If your business needs to collect or manage sensitive data for your customers, whether it’s patient information or financial data or credit card numbers, Data Privacy Day is a useful annual reminder to strengthen personal data protections.
The conditions of 2020–2021 are not necessarily bringing new threats to information security and data privacy, but the way people live and work now is causing more people to be vulnerable to scams.
Kevin Coleman, executive director of the National Cyber Security Alliance (NCSA), told Security Boulevard that “while we really haven’t seen new scams crop up as a result of the growing number of remote workers, what we have seen is the proliferation of the existing scams,” such as phishing schemes.
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has identified several coronavirus scams , such as fake contact tracers asking for confidential information, phishing emails claiming to be from reputable organizations offering vaccines and cures and scammers trying to trick people into giving money to fake charities. Be aware of the latest scams, train your employees on what to watch out for and help your people understand how to recognize scams and protect themselves (and your company) from fraudsters.
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Get FeaturedNot every small business needs a full suite of enterprise-grade data privacy and cybersecurity security tools. But no matter what size your business is, there are a few tools that you should consider using to help protect your business’s data privacy and any customer data that you have to maintain.
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) recommends several cybersecurity tips for small businesses to help strengthen your data privacy protections, including:
Don't forget about your website. Your business website is one of your biggest tools to reassure customers about their data privacy. Make sure to create a privacy policy for your website, explain how customer data is collected and used (if at all) and make guarantees about how you will never sell or disclose customer data to third parties. You can get a Privacy Policy Template with Bizee’s Contract Library .
Taking your customers’ data privacy to a new level of security in 2021 will be essential as we continue to battle threats to information security and data privacy. Use this Data Privacy Day to strengthen your data privacy plan for the protection of yourself and your business.
Ben Gran is a freelance writer from Des Moines, Iowa. Ben has written for Fortune 500 companies, the Governor of Iowa (who now serves as U.S. Secretary of Agriculture), the U.S. Secretary of the Navy, and many corporate clients. He writes about entrepreneurship, technology, food and other areas of great personal interest. Read more
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