As cyber security risks grow and new data protection requirements surface, navigating the privacy and security landscape has never been more cumbersome and demanding. Even an organization with a well-established and mature enterprise risk management program can keep a holistic view of risk up-to-date and able to actually identify individuals. The risks under control have become an arms race.
Below are some steps you can take to mitigate risk so that you have some control over your privacy and security risk management activities in 2023.
Conducting a risk assessment:
Not entirely surprising given the topic of this post, I’m not just thinking about specific DPIAs or features or site-specific security ratings here. Look ahead and see the big picture. Identify broader potential organizational risks, assess their root causes, and assess their likelihood and impact. This allows us to proactively manage risks and take appropriate measures to address them. Also, try to establish a strong connection between security and privacy features within your organization. Security risks often manifest themselves as data breaches. Additionally, data protection risks may require organizations to implement specific security measures. When privacy and security risk assessments take place in silos, they are not effectively managing risk.
We implement risk management procedures that go beyond mere regulatory compliance.
Establish policies and procedures to identify, mitigate, and manage risks that are broader than specific requirements that may result from legal requirements. This includes setting up systems to report and track risks, and implementing controls to prevent or mitigate identified risks. DPIAs and specific security assessments generally relate to specific events, services, or processing activities. A proactive and broader range of risk management should be repeated as an event-agnostic and forward-looking risk assessment.
Use technology to effectively manage and mitigate risk.
Implementing technical solutions such as cyber security measures, privacy management platforms with effective risk management built-in, recovery systems, and any technical measures and tools that may be You can reduce your risk significantly. Systems and tools don’t have to be expensive (compared to the cost of a data breach ;-), but they can greatly improve your ability to manage risk.
Create a contingency plan.
Things get worse, you get hacked, and you have a data breach. So create a contingency plan before it’s too late. Helps prepare for and manage unexpected (unexpected) events. Play to outline a course of action, relevant internal and external stakeholders to engage, and establish procedures necessary for crisis management communication and decision-making, in case the proverb strikes fans Prepare a book. And to test the plan, he should conduct fire drills in-house at least once a year.
Foster a culture of risk awareness:
Encourage your colleagues to be proactive in identifying and reporting risks. This will help you identify risks that you might not otherwise know about. Get executive buy-in to help promote a culture of risk awareness and management across the organization.
Regularly review and update risks.
As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, the privacy and security landscape is constantly changing. Therefore, review your risk management efforts regularly. This helps ensure that they are still relevant and effective in identifying and mitigating organizational risks.
