No copyright infringement intended
Over the last few weeks commercial radio stations have been playing “adverts” about data protection from the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) or perhaps better to call them public information announcements (albeit not as iconic as those public information films for those of us of a certain age such as the Green Cross Code or Reginald Molehusband (unfortunately original film was lost).
The ICO anouncements advise that
“Whatever your customers trust you to do, they trust you with their data too. So whether you’re a carpenter or a chiropodist. A florist or a financial advisor. An electrician or nail technician. Don’t forget, the new GDPR data protection rules apply to your business from the 25th of May. You could be fined if you ignore them.“
This is a welcome although belated addition to the first phase of a GDPR Roadmap for businesses. I’ve been surprised at the lack of awareness of the general small business community and pretty appalled at the attitude of those who at least know it’s going to happen. Merseyside Digital still has quite a bit to do but we are out of the starting gate. I’ve had responses from some businesses that they are OK and then I point out that their website needs “a few GDPR tweaks” which then amazingly prompts another response “What’s the GDPR?”
The ICO announcements underline that the General Data Protection Regulation is going to apply for businesses of all shapes and sizes and, for those businesses that are either unaware or haven’t yet started their GDPR Roadmap, they may be in for a shock.
If you would like to find out more about how the GDPR is going to affect your business, you can request
- a free 30-60 minute consultation
- a GDPR Starter Pack for Micro SMEs or
- to find out about how an online compliance service can help if you are a larger business.
Don’t start “crossing the road” without looking left and right at data protection or you could end up in a sticky Reginald Molehusband situation.