What is Data Privacy? Important Laws and Key Challenges

What is Data Privacy?

Data privacy is all about controlling and protecting your information with which people may identify you, from your name, and address, to your credit card number, bank details and even the sites you visit on the Internet. It is about protecting the ways of using the information you collected from being altered by other users or accessed by unauthorized personnel.
The reality is that we are all unconsciously revealing more than we should. Today we share information via social media platforms, applications in our mobile phones, online shopping sites etc. When we expose ourselves the more the likelihood of getting involved in a security breach, getting leaks and identity thefts. As a result, the protection of personal information is crucial, for every person and company.

Some people, frankly speaking, are simply ignorant about their privacy and do not see a reason why they should protect their data. It may not seem obvious but your personal information is worth way more than you probably think it is. Organizations apply it to make money. They achieve this by selling your data to third parties, changing your perceived online personality or advertising to you.

The complete guide to CJIS compliance for government bodies.This whitepaper serves as a comprehensive guide to CJIS compliance for government bodies.
Download Whitepaper

You need to be assured that an organization will take adequate measures in handling any information that is given to them right? In other words, you have no rights over how your data will be shared, used, or modified especially when you pass over the data to someone or an organization.
To businesses, the issue of respecting individuals’ data privacy is among the ways of gaining their confidence since consumers are more conscious of how their data is being processed and utilized and would like to work with companies that respect this aspect of their privacy. The compromise of data privacy affects a company’s reputation and financial position and is punishable by law.

To some extent, data privacy and data security are synonymous. But they tackle two different problems as pertains to data handling. They are, of course, important to know when considering an encompassing approach to the issue of data protection. Despite being critical elements of any data governance program, their role, aims, methods, and strategies sharply differ.

Data Privacy

Data privacy mainly concerns the collection, processing, and sharing of data that is associated with the individuals. The founding concept is that people should be able to dictate the use of their personal data. To the businesses, it implies that they should process the data in a way that complies with the legal measures and protects the user’s rights.

Major Elements of Data Privacy:

User Consent: Data collectors or users should seek prior permission from individuals in collecting or processing their information. For example, under GDPR before a business begins to process personal data from the users, the users have to provide their informed consent to the business.

Data Transparency: Concerned organizations need to let the users know what data is being taken, why it is being taken, and for how long it is going to be held. Transparency plays out a sense of confidence on the side of the users so that they are willing to share data with the applications.

Data Rights/Permissions: People have a right to obtain, update or delete their data. Virtually all legislation including the GDPR and CCPA dictate that individuals can freely exercise these rights and therefore have more control on their data.
The primary issue to address in data privacy is in how data is utilised to its rightful and legal end. For instance, if a company gets personal data for one reason, uses it for another without authorization, it infringes data privacy, regardless of outside intrusions.

Data Security

Data security, on the other hand, can be described as all the processes, precautions and policies that are followed to ensure that information is inaccessible to unauthorized personnel, is safe from hackers or is not easy to steal. Hence while privacy deals with how data is processed security makes certain that the data cannot be tampered with or  granted from within or externally.

Major Elements of Data Security:

Encryption: A widely applied security measure, it operates in a way where original data is coded making it barely comprehensible to unauthorized personnel without the proper cipher.

Access Control: The protection of data from unauthorized access is achieved through enhanced access control measures like MFA, RBAC, and least privilege. These assure only the personnel with authority can access some data.

Threat Detection and Prevention: Firewalls, IDS and anti-virus are important, which aim at protecting the information from outside risks such as viruses or hackers.

Security Audits: Conducting annual security review and security inspection also assists in determining the weaknesses in the system to avoid being penetrated by threats that may have not earlier existed.

Data security aims at making data inaccessible from any unauthorized access either through hacking, from within or system crashes. For example if an organization loses confidential information due to laxity in security like use of simple passwords and un-updated software the above is a data security risk. Yet, if a company abuses data while the latter is enclosed, it raises a privacy problem.

While data privacy and data security are distinct, they are closely intertwined, and a breach in one can lead to problems in the other. An organization can have a strong security system, but without privacy controls, it might misuse data in ways that violate legal and ethical standards. Conversely, even if a company follows all privacy regulations, a weak security framework could expose private data to unauthorized parties, resulting in privacy violations.

For example, a business may have resilient privacy policies but poor security practices, leading to unauthorized access to personal information. In such a case, both privacy and security have failed, as the data was accessed without consent, causing a breach of trust and compliance.

An Integrated Approach to Data Protection

To effectively safeguard data, businesses need an integrated approach that incorporates both privacy and security. Here’s how the two areas can work in synergy:

1. Privacy-Driven Security Policies: Data security measures should be informed by privacy requirements. For example, if privacy regulations require certain types of data to be deleted after a specific time, security protocols should ensure that the data is both securely deleted and inaccessible afterward.
2. End-to-End Encryption: While encryption is a security tool, it plays a key role in privacy as well by ensuring that personal data remains confidential during transmission and storage. This adds an extra layer of privacy protection against unauthorized access.
3. User Awareness and Consent: Security measures should be transparent to users. Informing them about how their data is being protected and giving them control over security settings strengthens both privacy and security. For instance, offering users the option to enable two-factor authentication protects their privacy through secure access control.
4. Compliance with Privacy Laws: Laws like GDPR and CCPA require businesses to implement appropriate security measures to protect personal data. Compliance with privacy regulations often means adhering to specific security protocols that ensure data remains safe from breaches.

By integrating privacy and security, organizations can create a holistic data protection framework that addresses the full scope of risks involved with managing personal information. Ignoring one aspect can leave notable gaps in the system, possibly exposing businesses to legal, financial, and reputational harm.

Having focused on the protection of personal information, organizations require following security measures. Let’s look at some considerable strategies for ensuring data privacy:

1. Data Minimization: Do not gather too much data; only get the information that is relevant to your analysis. The more data points you’re able to gather, the higher your risk. Eliminating the quantity of cached identifiable information minimizes one’s interaction with data leaks.
2. Transparency with Users: Users should be taught very specifically what data is being collected and why it is needed and how it is going to be utilized. Transparency makes users trust the site and it’s better when the users are given full control over their details.
3. Consent Management: Do not collect personal information from users without prior consent particularly when dealing the prohibited areas of personal data. Consent should be readable and reversible at any one time.
4. Data Encryption: Encrypt data whether it is being transmitted or is stored. This also geo assurets that in the event that data is captured or accessed by undesirable individuals, it cannot be decoded easily.
5. Regular Audits: It is also important to carry out periodic check-up of the existing data privacy procedures. This assists to pinpoint any weaknesses or holes in your data management and to check adherence with modern legislation.
6. Access Control: Give authorization only to the people who require the access to such information. The internal threats can only be managed through applying role-based access controls.
7. Anonymization and Pseudonymization: Examples of the methods to achieve privacy include anonymization or pseudonymization processes to remove identifying data. This lowers the likelihoods of data misuses while enhancing data usability.

Although data privacy is acknowledged by everyone, there are some several challenges that organizations encounter when implementing as well as maintaining the required privacy measures. Some of these challenges include:

1. Evolving Regulatory Landscape: There are differences in data privacy laws from country to country, making it challenging for multinational companies to handle such issues. This means that each country or region may have certain requirements complicating the task of data management.
2. Data Volume and Variety: Users, businesses, and IoT devices generate an increasing amount of data, which is difficult to monitor, control, and secure. The large unstructured data management especially challenges them.
3. Third-Party Risks: A lot of organizations subcontract data processing or data warehousing with another firm. In the event that a third party violates the privacy Act or incurs into a data breach, the primary organization takes the blame.
4. Technological Advancements: Technologies such as AI and machine learning for instance need large datasets on which results can be achieved. the use of  these technologies has numerous advantages, they also create new forms of data privacy threats.
5. Human Error: Each year, many companies suffer from a leak due to the mistakes of their employees. Enjoying their freedom, the employees may leak information or not adhere to the privacy policies, or get phished, all of which are dangerous for the organization.

Several important laws and standards have been adopted by many countries to protect privacy of the persons. Let’s take a look at some of the most notable ones:

General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR): Implemented in the European Union, GDPR is among the most stringent protection laws of personal information in the world. It offers individuals rights for management of their own data and insidious duties for same with business entities.

Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS): PCI DSS is a global standard that mandates organizations handling credit card data to implement security measures to protect cardholder information, thus reducing data breaches and fraud risks.

Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA): In the USA, medical information is protected under the HIPAA and this means that healthcare firms should employ means of ensuring patients’ data are secure.

California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA): This local law regulates the collection of personal data about Californian residents and grants them the right to require data controllers to reveal such data, request its deletion, and opt out of its sale.

Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX): It is a regulation of the US federal government that regulates the management of particular forms of data in an endeavor to guarantee data quality in all firms that operate on the stock exchange market; it is a massive component of data governance.

Organizations need to track and update their privacy policies to ensure they are consistent with the current legal requirements in multiple areas. Besides the laws stated above, other regulatory models, such as CMMC, CJIS, FISMA, GLBA, and ISO/IEC 27001, should also be taken into consideration when developing an effective data protection strategy.

Lepide Data Security Platform provides a comprehensive solution for businesses to ensure data privacy through the automation of key processes such as data discovery, classification, and monitoring. It helps organizations identify and protect sensitive data in compliance with legal and business requirements. By managing access control and offering real-time monitoring, Lepide ensures that only authorized personnel handle sensitive data. Additionally, its audit and compliance reporting capabilities enable businesses to meet regulatory standards like GDPR and HIPAA. With real-time alerts, Lepide assists in preventing data breaches by enabling proactive response to unauthorized activity.

More often than not, data privacy is the core aspect on the foundation of trust within the emerging digital world. With the changes in the data landscape and increase in the volume, range, and sources of personal information being collected, there is need for organizations to protect such information, not only because it is a legal requirement, but to build and promote corporate ethical responsibility as well as garner customer loyalty. Still, there are obstacles that businesses must overcome, including the equipment of the top practices and the study of new rules and regulations, as well as using outstanding solutions. Most importantly, good data privacy practices make up a fundamental key for the creation of a safer, more secure, and transparent environment for businesses as well as individuals.

If you want to know more about how Lepide can help you secure your data, feel free to schedule a demo with one of our engineers today.