Privacy Ref

The General Data Privacy Regulations, GDPR, are less than a year away.  Businesses around the world actively participating in the markets of the European Union are scrambling to comply with the new law.  We at Privacy Ref have been looking at how to best assess an organization’s readiness for compliance with the different articles of

You may be interested in how Wells Fargo has been handling the fallout from their recent scandal.  The summary of the incident is that sales personnel at Wells Fargo were so pressured to meet numbers that they created fake accounts using real consumer information. The practice was rampant at the company.  After being fined just

With the IAPP Privacy Summit less than a month away, it is time to start planning what you will be doing there.  If you are going to the Summit this year, there are a large number of sessions, speakers, and exhibitors for you to check out and learn from.  This stands alone from the thousands

In recent weeks, leaks have been at the forefront of news.  This is mostly in a political spectrum, but it illustrates the importance of managing how information flows through an organization.  There have been examples other than those coming from the White House though. Being non-political in nature, they have different consequences and lessons to

A new year usually means setting a goal to remodel that extra bedroom, cut out caffeine, or finally hit the gym for 30 minutes a day.  This year you have an even greater goal in mind, the improvement of your privacy program.  Here are some great ways to start you on your way to achieving

(Note, this post first appeared in the Operational Privacy blog on CIO.com) Data Privacy Day (DPD), held every January 28 and coordinated by the National Cyber Security Alliance (NCSA), is an international effort highlighting “Respecting Privacy, Safeguarding Data and Enabling Trust.\” DPD provides an opportunity for you to re-enforce these themes within your organization to

Recently I saw an interesting image on twitter from @darrencauthon.  The image was a television with an alleged FBI notice notifying the individual that their new smart TV had “suspicious files” and that they were being penalized $500 before they could use their TV again.  All of this is accompanied by legal jargon meant to

Within 24 hours, I have had some interesting interactions with strong, or sometimes not-so-strong, passwords.  I figured now was a good time to go over some of the pitfalls you might encounter when trying to implement a new password policy for your customers or employees.