How can you take advantage of the Changing Data Privacy Landscape in India?
Due to the risk of mass monitoring and other national security considerations, the notion of data privacy has been aggressively growing across numerous nations. In India, popular pressure and official initiatives to enforce data privacy regulations have accelerated as a result of recent incidents such as the Adhaar dispute, the Pegasus incident, and the increased number of cybersecurity attacks.
Here are some tips to help organisations that manage user data in India take advantage of the shifting privacy landscape in India.
1. Meet compliance obligations
For failing to comply with laws, rules, standards, and their own public privacy and security alerts, organisations who fail to adopt privacy measures face tens of millions of dollars in penalties and up to 20-year prison terms (as seen under the EU GDPR). In India, the joint parliamentary committee on personal data protection presented a proposal for punitive penalties for significant data violations in December 2021, with fines of up to 15 crores, or 4% of global income, while minor infractions would be limited to 5 crores, or 2% of global revenue. Organizations that fail to satisfy their contractual privacy protection requirements risk losing lucrative commercial relationships.
- Prevent breaches that pose a risk to enterprises
Personal data security is a privacy concept recognised by all international privacy standards and mandated by all data protection and privacy regulatory obligations. As a result, organisations that adopt such safeguards will see a reduction in the amount of security incidents that result in data breaches. Fewer breaches indicate that the organisation does not lose trust, and hence does not lose clients or other sorts of business. It also implies that if a violation occurs, the corporation will not suffer fines, multi-year penalties, or legal action.
- Prevent data breaches that are harmful to data subjects or individuals
Maintaining strong security for personal data and its related activities such as data collecting, storage, processing, accessing, transferring, sharing, and disposal are all part of privacy precautions. Historically, businesses did not have comprehensive, robust data security safeguards in place throughout the whole organisation, from inception to delivery. Breaches that negatively impact data subjects can be avoided by implementing personal data security standards.
- Preserve and enhance the brand value
As a result of a data breach, organisations’ reputations and brand value have suffered. Companies that explicitly state that protecting their customers’ privacy is a primary goal, care about their customers’ privacy, and support meeting that goal through transparent and consistent privacy practises that demonstrate this care will build emotional attachments to their brand, increasing brand value.
- Strengthen and develop the business
Most citizens demand control over the organisations and persons that may collect information about them, as well as the specific types of information that can be accessed. These perspectives appear to be universal. Enterprises that implement privacy precautions and provide such controls will strengthen and grow their businesses because customers prefer them over competitors who do not supply such measures.
- Encourage ethical behaviour
Most firms have business ethics policies in place, as well as a code of ethics. Those that haven’t must nonetheless follow ethical practises if they wish to stay in business for any length of time. Such ethical rules frequently specify that sensitive information will be handled responsibly, that it will not be utilised in corporate operations in ways that cause damage, and that it will only be used for commercial purposes.
- Maintain the trust of the public, investors and customers
Individuals whose personal data has been hacked frequently lose trust in the organisation that has been compromised (either directly, or as a result of a breach in one of their contracted vendors). They choose to do their business elsewhere. Organizations that fail to implement privacy measures and subsequently have breaches will lose confidence, resulting in decreased profitability and fewer customers.
- Give your customers what they want
Due to the increasing awareness of their expanding rights to be notified by companies who collect their personal data, individuals now expect their data to be protected and have the right to access and control it. The ordinary person is more concerned about their privacy than they have ever been. And, as our children learn more about privacy in elementary and secondary school, they have higher expectations, even before they reach adulthood, of having more control over how their personal data is obtained, used, analysed, and shared.
- Gain competitive advantage by gaining consumer loyalty
Many consumers are worried about online privacy and security problems, and as a result, many of them refrain from engaging in certain online behaviours. These fundamental privacy issues, and how they effect public behaviour, show that if your organisation can demonstrate that it genuinely cares about the privacy of the personal data it gathers and processes, you will have a considerable advantage over rivals that do not prioritise privacy.
- Increase physical security
As a result of a lack of privacy rights, the associated individuals have experienced significant physical injury. The “Driver’s Privacy Protection Act,” passed in California in 1997, was inspired primarily by the 1989 murder of Rebecca Schaeffer, an actress on the USA TV show “My Sister Sam” who was stalked by a fan who obtained her home address simply by going to the California State Department of Transportation, then went to her home and shot her. Until now, similar instances have occurred all throughout the world. Personal data protection frequently protects the physical safety of data subjects.
- Encourage innovation
Many individuals feel that adding security and privacy safeguards into new technologies, products, and services stifles innovation. This is a completely false assertion. In reality, actively managing privacy inside emerging technology broadens and enhances the breadth of the achievements. They are unaffected by it. Privacy should be regarded as a baseline need for every new technology or service holding personal data, rather than as a differentiator or something to be done only when legally required. Developing safe privacy-protecting solutions that decrease privacy risk demands more imagination than just excluding such constraints.
