Right to erasure and data protection are biggest GDPR challenges

The right to erasure and data protection requirements are the greatest GDPR compliance challenges according to a new survey.

According to the GDPR Preparation and Challenges Survey Report from Cloud Security Alliance (CSA), which collected over 1,000 respondents addressing GDPR challenges, said the regulations ‘right to erasure’ was cited as the biggest challenge with 53%.

‘Data protection by design and by default’ landed 42% and ‘records of processing activities with 39% are cited as among the biggest challenges organisations face in achieving compliance with the regulation.

Netskope, commissioned CSA to assess the preparedness of organisations across a wide spectrum of industries in terms of their ability to meet the May 25, 2018, European Union General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) compliance deadline.

“With enforcement of the new regulation beginning in a matter of weeks, not months or years, and with serious monetary penalties at stake, security and privacy can no longer be an afterthought,” said Netskope CEO Sanjay Beri. “Alarmingly, 27 percent of survey respondents reported having little to no familiarity with the GDPR even with the deadline for compliance a little more than a month away. This holds serious implications for enterprises as well as their customers.”

The report also found that documentation of data-collection policies (68%), codes of conduct (56%), and third-party audits and assessments (55%) are among the most common tools being used to demonstrate GDPR compliance.

Eighty-three percent of companies said they not feel very prepared for GDPR, with companies in the APAC region feeling less prepared than other regions. While 31% of companies said they have well-defined plans for meeting GDPR compliance, 85 percent have something in place, and 73 percent have begun executing that plan.

Netskope is a provider of cloud security, helping the world’s largest organisations ‘take full advantage’ of the cloud and web without sacrificing security. Its patented Cloud XD technology claims to eliminate blind spots by going deeper than any other security provider to quickly target and control activities across thousands of cloud services and millions of websites.

According to a survey sponsored by international law firm McDermott Will & Emery and carried out by the Ponemon Institute, many companies are behind schedule to achieve Global Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) compliance. The survey showed that 40% of companies expect to achieve compliance with the regulation after the deadline.

A recent survey of tech decision makers, compiled by Crowd Research Partners, also found that fewer than 40% are confident that their organisations will be compliant with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).