The need to demonstrate compliance is the main motivation for privacy technology adoption, according to new findings.
According to research of 345 privacy professionals by TrustArc and the IAPP, technology solutions are helping 92% of organizations to keep pace with new privacy laws. Meanwhile products that help businesses discover and map data flows top the list of purchase plans, and privacy teams are playing a larger role in privacy tech purchasing decisions as organizations navigate a complex field of regulations.
“As the number of privacy regulations grows, organizations must contend with the complexity of managing an increasingly fragmented privacy regulatory landscape,” said Chris Babel, CEO of TrustArc.
“These rapid regulatory changes make cross-regulation management more difficult. As a result, organizational leaders are purchasing technology that can streamline the process of building global privacy compliance at scale, while turning more to privacy and data protection professionals for purchase input.”
TrustArc said that the increasing complexity of business in the digital world, coupled with a growing list of global privacy frameworks, has increased the need for organizations to adopt solutions that demonstrate compliance and are scalable and efficient.
The survey found that the top purchase plans for the next 12 months include: data mapping/flow (24%), data discovery (23%), assessment management (20%) and subject access request/individual rights (18%).
Also in comparison to statistics from last year’s survey, demand for privacy legal updates and information management solutions grew by 5%.
In an email to Infosecurity, Rik Turner, principal analyst at Ovum, said that there were no surprises around discovery and mapping data flows being popular, as while asset discovery is an essential part of any IT department’s job, institutions have real problems finding all the data they have on individuals within their multiple database instances, applications, etc.
“Data discovery is thus a vital precursor to any compliance activity: you can’t wrap control around data till you know everywhere it resides within your organization and have classified and categorized it,” he said. “Of course, understanding how and where data flows, who accesses it and where it is copied to, is a vital part of data discovery.”