Governments all over the world are noticing an increasing amount of cyber attacks and data breaches and are starting to take action. For example, the California Consumer Privacy Act is set to go into effect on January 1, 2020, affecting companies doing business in California. More countries are expected to continue updating their laws or create new ones as privacy concerns increase and the cybersecurity landscape continues to change. However, it can be difficult keeping up with all the changes.

Source: Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada

Challenges With Compliance

Compliance regulations differ across industries and countries. Industries that work with sensitive information, such as financial and healthcare sectors, are more tightly regulated than others.

It’s difficult to keep up with constant regulatory changes as business needs and technologies can affect your efforts. But organizations that fail to comply with regulations face a wide variety of consequences, including: fines, legal repercussions, stakeholder/customer dissatisfaction, etc.

How Can My Business Manage Changing Compliance Regulations?

Conduct Assessments: Conducting an assessment on your IT infrastructure will help bring attention to gaps or areas in your network that need improvements. An assessment can look at your current compliance efforts and make suggestions or point out potential risks to ensure you’re properly compliant. Depending on the industry your business is in, an assessment can specifically look at the regulations that directly impact your business. If you’re interested in receiving an assessment, you can contact us for one today.

Use SIEM: Compliance regulations are putting more emphasis on detecting and reporting breaches. Consumers are becoming increasingly concerned with privacy and data leaks which is why breach reporting is important. Having a Security Information Event Management (SIEM) system like Secure IT – SIEM in your network will help protect your data by detecting threats using behavioural analysis. This will help keep your business compliant by monitoring and remediating events.

Subscribe to newsletters: The laws are constantly changing and the best way to get the most accurate news is to subscribe to government and legislative newsletters. In addition, you should also subscribe to reputable news sources that focus on the industry your business is in. Those sources will usually have the most pertinent, up-to-date information. You can also bookmark governments website and check them regularly or subscribe to Google alerts.

Hire a Compliance Officer: If you are able to, hiring a compliance officer will help ensure your company stays informed of the latest compliance requirements. This person should be well versed in national and international regulatory guidelines and standards and understand your business needs. Your compliance officer should help develop and drive your business strategies and help you understand the regulations. If