Yesterday was recognized as World Data Privacy Day globally, except in the EU, where it is known as the Data Protection Day.
In most online magazines, there were articles about how to protect yourself. The Data Economy website has provided 10 tips for safeguarding your data. Some good ones include:
- Carefully read and modify your privacy settings on websites you visit
- Actively manage your reputation online, by deciding who can see your content
- Always use added security, beyond simple passwords, for your online accounts
- Be aware of what others are posting about you, this can impact your online reputation big-time
- Always keep a backup of your online data, including photos, posts, credit card statements etc.
If you look at large corporations, there are active data security and privacy policies in place. They protect and enable the organization to safely handle consumer data in compliance with the laws in different countries or states. Here is a link to Walmart's Privacy Policy, which is also the largest corporation in the world. However, despite these efforts, data breaches can still occur, with significant financial and reputational impact to both firms and consumers. This CISO article lists 5 major breaches that occurred in recent times.
For consumers, there are the data protection laws that protect their online and offline data. However, a point to note is that these don't actively protect you against hacking or other attacks on your reputation. They will provide a legal framework to address the issues that arise if your privacy is breached.
For victims of identity theft or data theft, the consequences can be
immense, and it is a prolonged process to recover from the same. There
is also a comedy movie from Hollywood called Identity Thief released in 2013 that touches on this subject.
If you are concerned about your privacy, or identity management, ensure that you follow at least some basic security protocols, such as those listed above. Depending on the country you live in, data recovery or reputation management can be very difficult once data is released in the public domain.