Gdpr
February 07, 2022

Earning user trust by prioritising data protection compliance

By LawBite Team

Protecting people's privacy is not only the right thing to do, but it is key in earning trust.
In 2022, armed with the knowledge gained from the Cambridge Analytica scandal and books such as The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, consumers now demand that companies protect their personal data and prevent data breaches.
In this short article, our expert GDPR and data protection lawyers explain everything you need to know about earning your users' trust by prioritising data protection compliance.

What are the compliance requirements for protecting personal data?

There are several pieces of legislation that all SMEs must be familiar with to ensure they comply with data protection and privacy law, namely:

The UK GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation)
The EU GDPR (if you control or process personal data from EU Member States)
The Data Protection Act 2018
The Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations 2003 (PECR)

>> If you have an online business there are additional data protection and privacy regulations you need to comply with and you can discover more about those in our blog E-commerce regulations - what you need to know.

The most significant aspects of data protection small businesses must be aware of are:

Subject access requests (SARs) –refers to a person’s right to access the personal data you have that relates to them. A SAR can be made verbally or in writing and with few exceptions you have one month to respond to the request. In most cases, you will be unable to charge a fee for providing the data subject with the information they have requested.
Data breaches – If a data breach occurs you must report details of the breach to the appropriate supervising authority (in the UK this is the ICO) within 72 hours of discovering the breach (if feasible). If the breach results in a high risk of adversely affecting individuals’ rights and freedoms affected people must be informed of the breach as soon as possible.

To comply with privacy and data protection regulations you must ensure that you have mapped the personal data you hold so it can be quickly accessed if a breach or SAR occurs.

You also need to have robust breach detection, investigation, and internal reporting procedures in place and invest in privacy training for all employees who deal with personal data.

Does prioritising data protection provide a competitive advantage?

Absolutely. A recent study showed that 39% of people in the UK do not trust marketers with their personal data. This damning statistic is attributed to the fact that 87% of those surveyed receive marketing communications from brands that they have no recollection of opting in for.

By actually complying with data protection and privacy principles and being fully transparent with your customers on how their data is processed, as opposed to merely claiming to do so, you will quickly establish your brand as one that people can trust with the most precious parts of their humanity – their privacy.

To find out more about data protection and privacy compliance, please contact LawBite today.

Get legal assistance from LawBite

Confused about the GDPR requirements and how to ensure your user’s trust? LawBite expert GDPR and Data Protection lawyers are ready to help. Our solicitors will ensure you protect the personal information you handle correctly and give you the legal assistance you need.

Book a free 15-minute consultation with one of our GDPR and data protection lawyers today!

Additional useful information

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Whether you are bringing or defending a legal claim, outsourcing work, want a business contract review to ward off disagreements, talk to an expert trademark lawyer, resolve a contractual dispute with methods like mediation and arbitration, or getting your new company set up and on the right footing with a robust shareholder agreement and GDPR standards, we can help you succeed.