We live in a digital era, where everything is just a click away and where users regularly rely on websites to form an opinion, read a review or buy something. The data users give to companies has become a vital resource that must be handled with care, respect and transparency. The GDPR supports this idea, dictating which rules must be complied with and listing the applicable sanctions. Sanctions that include exorbitant fines bearing in mind that Google was hit with a 57-million USD fine earlier this year.
Obviously, the sanctions are flexible, and they depend on the company’s size and notoriety as well as the seriousness of the violation. While a lot of attention was focused on which actions large companies took in response to the GDPR this past year, the situation varies depending on the country. In Germany and France, companies tend to be very rigorous when it comes to managing and applying the GDPR. But there are cultural differences of course: the German severity and the rigor of the CNIL (the French Data Protection Authority) are easily recognized. In these countries, and elsewhere, the main issue however, was to educate people about the problem of data protection and the GDPR to prevent them from making errors. At ACTITO, we recommend transparency, a culture of trust and communication: customers must feel that they are a priority and must know that their voice is heard and that someone is listening. Watch our Spring '18 Release – GDPR Special again to find out more about how ACTITO adapted its marketing automation platform to be GDPR-compliant.