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Lawmakers cannot turn blind eyes to the several privacy issues flying around. It is interesting how they now involve themselves actively in privacy matters. If they choose to refrain from the topic of privacy, privacy violations will come back to hunt them as long as they tender their data to certain companies they interact with.
However, these legislations are periodically revamped to meet trending privacy issues. This will continue as long as companies collect data and breaches exist. In this article, we will examine privacy legislation, its future, and how business leaders should prepare for the future.
What is Privacy Legislation?
Privacy legislation is a set of legal provisions that regulate the collection, use, disclosure, or sharing of customers’ personally identifiable information (PII).
Business Leaders and Privacy Legislations
Recently, Virginia, Colorado, and California signed the privacy legislation. Similarly, Utah passed its Consumer Privacy Act into law. These actions are examples that other states and countries should emulate.
As business leaders might be unfamiliar with these laws, they must take their time to study them for effective application. This means proper understanding will aid compliance. However, business owners who own companies in other states or cater to customers in other states must understand the privacy laws in those places and obey them.
Business leaders must fully participate in privacy bill-to-law processes to foster the growth and potency of privacy laws. Business leaders who wish to comply with privacy laws should also acquaint themselves with how privacy started to exist in their states. This will inform their decisions on how to conduct themselves according to the law and not invade their customers’ rights to privacy.
Virginia and Colorado passed the privacy act into law in 2022, while Utah followed suit in 2022. This only marks the beginning of privacy legislation because more states will do the same. In the future, businesses who violate customers’ privacy should be willing to appear in court, as Massachusetts’ policymakers are planning to give customers the liberty to file lawsuits upon privacy violation. This liberty hinges on the approval of the policy, though.
What Business Leaders must Know about Privacy Laws
Privacy laws are wide. Hence, business owners might find it hard to capture the provisions of those laws. So here, we shall highlight some things you must bear in mind as a business owner.
- Rules & Regulations
Rules and regulations that guide the use, disclosure, storing, and sharing of customer data are derived through legislation. These legislations provide detailed information about the limits of businesses when they interact with customer data.
The legislations also capture what companies must do to maintain customer privacy. Again, they state the punishments that non-compliance draws. With the strong backing of the legislation, customers can sue businesses if they realize that their privacy has been invaded.
2. Identity Confirmation
After receiving customer data, a business must verify that the data is accurate. They must use their data processing technologies to filter data errors. Failing to take data through this step could lead to misuse or mishandling, thereby getting exposed to attackers.
In turn, customers might take legal actions as provided in the GDPR. If proven guilty, such a business would pay fines. Often, fines make up 3% to 4% of a business’ annual revenue. To avoid this, a business should not rush to use customer data. Instead, they must confirm their identities and ensure that the information is accurate.
3. Preventing Protocol Breach
To avoid protocol breaches, set up data encryption, use security agents, and antivirus software. When a company experiences as little as a protocol breach attempt (and not the actual breach), it can still be sued under Canada’s internet safety act, PIPEDA (Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act).
For businesses to win this case, they must prove that data protection measures are in place. Likewise, they must establish that their systems are up-to-date and were able to prevent the breach.
4. Employees’ Privacy Rights
Employees have as many rights to data privacy, just as customers have. For example, the GDPR allows employees to request a change to their digital information. They can also exercise the right to be forgotten and take civil actions.
Privacy legislations protect customers’ privacy by outlining what business leaders must do. Business leaders should know that legislators will continue to make privacy legislation. Therefore, they must learn legal privacy provisions and adapt to them.
At Zendata, we can help you soak in various privacy provisions to avoid the consequences of non-compliance.
