GDPR: A major asset for European companies

When discussing the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), two main issues are often raised: the benefits it brings to individuals, or the financial and organisational consequences it has on companies. However, its representing a real key asset for European firms is often omitted.

GDPR has been written about extensively, but often in a somewhat alarming and emotional fashion for European companies, parcularly by insisting on the difficulty they will face in walking their teams into the dynamics of a new process as well as security behavioral change while meeting a deadline. Yes, GDPR causes important changes for EU companies, but the latter also reinforces their position within the international space.

Nearly 2.3 billion euros saved each year thanks to GDPR

It is not uncommon for many of us to forget that this regulation originally comes from the wish of 90% of European companies to have a common regulation on data protection. Indeed, each member state has its own regulation regarding the management and protection of this data, and companies are bound to respect specific administrative procedures as soon as the data in question is crossing borders. This represents a total amount of nearly 2.3 billion euros each year for European companies!

Set to enter into application by May 2018, the GDPR will put an end to these overwhelming costs. Indeed, it will be common to all 28 UE member States, which is good news for companies.

GDPR encourages the free flow of personal data

Free flow is central to the ideals of the EU. As a result, European personal data can be freely shared by individuals or between companies, as soon as all the parties at stake authorize it. Because it is common to all of the 27 member States, the GDPR multiplies the opportunities granted by the free flow of personal data for European companies while facilitating access. Moreover, a study run by the EU in January 2016 shows that European personal data acquire more and more value and will reach nearly 1 billion euros by 2020, only 2 years after the GDPR will be set into application. European companies will then hold extremely valuable and coveted data which is a major competitive asset on a global scale.

Compliance to GDPR: creating a real relationship of trust

This advantage can however scare away European customers – according to the same study, 80% of them fear that they won’t have total control over their personal data. In the digital era, digital trust is of paramount importance for the reputation and success of EU or non EU companies.

GDPR comforts individuals on these issues and particularly enables European companies to take a stand as actors in this project. It provides them with the requirements to set up real information security policies. These policies seek in details to guarantee availability, privacy and integrity of personal data via:

• data track recordings to detect cyber-risks and their potential impacts;
• security measure implementations to neutralize the risks thanks to strict control settings and a secure architecture;
• periodic testing of security measures;
• notification, analysis, and development of an action plan to correct and neutralize the wrong, should an incident happen.

WALLIX Bastion helps European companies to rise to the challenges of GDPR and encourages digital trust for them to ensure their success. This all-inclusive privileged access management (PAM) solution can be deployed on SSH or RDP clients and is CSPN certified by the ANSSI (Agence nationale de la sécurité des systèmes d’information). It also allows companies to manage and monitor access to sensitive data. Core features include:

• A password vault – strengthens privacy control with customized access governance;
• A session management tool – accurately tracks actions on sensitive data taken during a privileged account session. Sessions can be real-time recorded and supervised. Audit reports and metadata collection can be generated.

For more information visit our website at www.wallix.com or click here to request a Free Trial of the Bastion