Data protection regulations and compliance
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Feature
05 Apr 2024
Seven ways to be sure you can restore from backup
Backups are no good if you can’t restore from them. We look at key elements of backup restoration, including backup audits, RPOs and RTOs, and how and when to test backups Continue Reading
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Podcast
28 Mar 2024
Podcast: What is distributed cloud storage and what are its benefits?
We talk to Enrico Signoretti of Cubbit about how distributed cloud allows customers to control their data in hybrid and multicloud storage and the workloads the company targets Continue Reading
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Feature
19 Jan 2022
Cloud-era disaster recovery planning: Assessing risk and business impact
In the first in a series on cloud-era disaster recovery, we provide a step-by-step guide to building firm foundations for the disaster recovery plan, with risk assessment and business impact analysis Continue Reading
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News
17 Jan 2022
Test police algorithms in court rather than legislate, Lords told
Police algorithms and their impacts should be tested and challenged in court, rather than controlled by new laws, says policing minister Continue Reading
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Podcast
14 Jan 2022
Podcast: 2022 compliance preview – GDPR goes global
We talk to Mathieu Gorge, CEO of VigiTrust, about what’s looming in compliance, with regulations based on the principles of the General Data Protection Regulation plus the concept of cyber accountability Continue Reading
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News
12 Jan 2022
OVHCloud hit with customer class action over March 2021 datacentre fire
OVHCloud said it cannot comment at this time on the legal action, which is being embarked upon to compensate customers who claim to have lost data as a result of the public cloud firm’s datacentre fire in March 2021 Continue Reading
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News
21 Dec 2021
Top 10 cloud storage, DR and datacentre storage stories of 2021
Key articles from 2021 that demonstrate the growing importance of cloud storage and disaster recovery, but also the snags that lead to cloud repatriation and difficulties restoring from the cloud Continue Reading
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News
20 Dec 2021
Top 10 ransomware and backup stories of 2021
Key articles from 2021 that highlight the link between ransomware and snapshots and backup and their role in repelling attacks, plus effects of the pandemic on backup and recovery Continue Reading
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News
15 Dec 2021
Gig economy algorithmic management tools ‘unfair and opaque’
Report published by Worker Info Exchange warns of algorithmically enabled rights abuses in the gig economy, noting the insufficient transparency of employers and the lacklustre nature of legal redress Continue Reading
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News
14 Dec 2021
IT priorities 2022: Ransomware and cloud drive storage and backup
The pandemic and the move to the cloud has driven cloud storage as a key priority Continue Reading
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E-Zine
14 Dec 2021
The rules for a safer internet
In this week’s Computer Weekly, as the government publishes the Online Safety Bill, we look at what the laws mean for internet services. A ransomware victim shares the insider story of the trauma of losing their corporate IT systems. And we ask, what happens when quantum computers get too powerful to verify their output? Read the issue now. Continue Reading
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News
01 Dec 2021
Unesco member states adopt AI ethics recommendation
The non-binding recommendation seeks to define a common set of values and principles to guide the development of ethical AI globally Continue Reading
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News
30 Nov 2021
Over 100 civil society groups call for changes to EU AI Act
Civil, human and digital rights organisations sign open letter calling on European policymakers to put fundamental rights at the heart of the proposed Artificial Intelligence Act Continue Reading
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Feature
19 Nov 2021
Cloud storage compliance pitfalls: Post-pandemic and post-Brexit
We look at the key areas of cloud storage compliance that can trip you up, with shared responsibility with cloud providers and data residency among the most important Continue Reading
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E-Zine
18 Nov 2021
CW APAC: Expert guide to storage management
The storage landscape is evolving at pace. In this handbook, focused on storage management in the Asia-Pacific region, Computer Weekly looks at how firms are rising to the storage challenge, Lenovo’s viewpoint on the region’s market opportunities, how the Malaysian Highway Authority made itself more cyber secure and the advantages of Nexustorage’s latest offering Continue Reading
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News
12 Nov 2021
New law needed to rein in AI-powered workplace surveillance
MPs and peers call for new legislation to regulate the growing use of artificial intelligence in the workplace, which is being used to surveil workers’ performance and behaviour Continue Reading
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News
12 Nov 2021
Oversight of biometrics and surveillance should not go to ICO
Biometrics and surveillance camera commissioner Fraser Sampson has panned the UK government’s proposed plan to absorb the functions of those roles under the remit of the information commissioner Continue Reading
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Opinion
11 Nov 2021
The ICO is right to push back against government meddling
Some criticisms of the ICO are justified, but the answer to that is not to give Whitehall more oversight over the data protection regulator, argues legal expert Edward Machin Continue Reading
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News
09 Nov 2021
Yoti develops age estimation algorithm for under-13s
Age estimation technology developed by Yoti is being pitched as a way of helping social media platforms and other online businesses protect younger internet users from harm Continue Reading
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News
08 Nov 2021
Gig economy workforce nearly trebles over five years
Over four million people in England and Wales now work for gig economy platforms at least once a week, marking a nearly threefold increase since 2016 Continue Reading
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Feature
05 Nov 2021
Immutable snapshots aim to neutralise ransomware
Snapshots – usually immutable anyway – get functionality to stop ransomware intruders moving or deleting snapshots, so customers know they have clean copies of data to restore from Continue Reading
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News
03 Nov 2021
Facebook self-imposes facial recognition moratorium
Facebook and Meta have committed to halting their use of facial recognition technology and deleting the biometric data of more than a billion people by the end of 2021, but will retain the underlying algorithms and software for potential use in future products Continue Reading
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E-Zine
02 Nov 2021
What the Budget means for UK technology
In this week’s Computer Weekly, we look through the Chancellor’s Autumn Budget and Spending Review to find what it means for the UK tech sector. As COP26 starts, we assess the green credentials of the IT industry. And we hear one CTO’s experiences of learning the privacy lessons of GDPR. Read the issue now. Continue Reading
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News
27 Oct 2021
Cohesity beefs up ransomware and disaster recovery offer
Disaster Recovery as-a-service, Data Govern and project Fort Knox available or in development as data protection supplier augments its portfolio with ransomware firmly in mind Continue Reading
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News
22 Oct 2021
MEPs vote to expand Europol data mandate
The European Parliament has voted in favour of expanding Europol’s mandate to process data and develop AI tools, but critics claim it contradicts a previous vote which opposed using new technologies to predict crime Continue Reading
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Feature
13 Oct 2021
APAC expert guide to storage management
In this expert guide to storage management in Asia-Pacific, we unpack the developments shaping storage management and key strategies to extract business value from data Continue Reading
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News
12 Oct 2021
Ban UK police use of facial-recognition, House of Lords told
Experts giving evidence to the House of Lords have said that UK police use of facial-recognition technology is disproportionate and ineffective, and further questioned the utility of algorithmic crime ‘prediction’ tools Continue Reading
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News
11 Oct 2021
Malaysia’s highway authority improves DR capabilities
The Malaysian Highway Authority is now more resilient against cyber attacks through a local disaster-recovery-as-a-service offering powered by Veeam software Continue Reading
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Opinion
07 Oct 2021
Addressing the backup dilemma to ransomware recovery
Everyone knows good backups are essential if one is to recover from a ransomware attack, but using them effectively poses challenges that IT teams need to know about Continue Reading
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News
07 Oct 2021
ICO expresses concerns over its future independence
In its response to the government’s data protection consultation, the Information Commissioner’s Office has raised worries over its future ability to function independently of government interference Continue Reading
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News
01 Oct 2021
Met Police purchase new retrospective facial-recognition system
Retrospective facial-recognition software purchased for £3m by the Met Police will be deployed in coming months amid continuing controversy around the use of biometric technologies by law enforcement bodies Continue Reading
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News
28 Sep 2021
Digital regulators need discrete but cooperative remits
The UK’s information commissioner has told MPs that digital economy regulators need discrete remits backed up by strong information sharing powers to both provide clear focus as well as allow for greater cooperation between their disparate but interlinked regimes Continue Reading
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News
27 Sep 2021
GCP gets triple-redundant NAS and built-in Kubernetes backup
Google Filestore Enterprise will provide synchronous replication across three zones, while Backup for Google Kubernetes Engine brings built-in container cluster data protection Continue Reading
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News
20 Sep 2021
NGO Fair Trials calls on EU to ban predictive policing systems
The use of artificial intelligence to predict criminal behaviour should be banned because of its discriminatory outcomes and high risk of further entrenching existing inequalities, claims Fair Trials Continue Reading
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News
15 Sep 2021
UN human rights chief calls for moratorium on AI technologies
High commissioner’s call for a moratorium on the use of AI systems that pose a serious risk to human rights is accompanied by a UN report on the negative human rights impacts associated with the technology Continue Reading
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Opinion
08 Sep 2021
Security Think Tank: Optimising privacy, post-GDPR
Airbus CyberSecurity CTO Paddy Francis explores the impact of regulation on data protection, and how it has changed how one goes about optimising data privacy in the enterprise Continue Reading
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Opinion
07 Sep 2021
Security Think Tank: A response to planned data protection changes
The ISF’s Emma Bickerstaffe assesses how organisations might respond to proposed changes to the UK’s data protection regime Continue Reading
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Opinion
06 Sep 2021
UK’s new data protection strategy risks costing business more than it gains
The apparent business benefits of pursuing data adequacy agreements around the world may not be as enticing as they at first appear Continue Reading
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Opinion
02 Sep 2021
Security Think Tank: Managing data securely throughout its lifecycle
Managing data in a secure manner is key to ensuring its integrity and therefore its value to the organisation, as well as reducing risk from breaches and misinformation Continue Reading
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News
27 Aug 2021
Are proposed data protection changes a threat to UK citizens’ privacy?
Though changes are as-yet undefined pending an upcoming consultation, concerns are already being expressed over the government’s plan to liberalise data protection laws in the service of innovation and growth Continue Reading
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News
26 Aug 2021
Government unveils post-Brexit data flow proposals
The government will pursue data partnerships with countries including Australia, South Korea and the US as part of a post-Brexit data regime that may also see substantial changes to the UK’s data protection law Continue Reading
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Opinion
26 Aug 2021
Security Think Tank: Steps to a solid data privacy practice
Petra Wenham of the BCS shares her expertise on building, or rebuilding, a solid business data privacy practice in a post-Covid-19 world Continue Reading
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News
26 Aug 2021
NZ privacy lead John Edwards named new information commissioner
DCMS has named John Edwards, currently New Zealand privacy commissioner, to succeed Elizabeth Denham as UK information commissioner Continue Reading
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News
24 Aug 2021
Over a million opt out of NHS data-sharing
Failure to communicate benefits of data-sharing proposals and privacy concerns are prompting large numbers of people to opt out of a proposed NHS Digital scheme Continue Reading
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News
23 Aug 2021
Veeam survey: Big cloud impact on backup and disaster recovery
Backup specialist finds cloud eclipses on-site compute for all workloads while DR makes big strides in the cloud despite concerns about complexity and security Continue Reading
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News
19 Aug 2021
Pub apps harvesting swathes of customer data unnecessarily
Some pub and restaurant chain apps demand data such as gender and marital status, raising eyebrows among privacy campaigners Continue Reading
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Feature
04 Aug 2021
Disaster recovery for SMEs: Five key areas to consider
We look at key disaster recovery considerations for SMEs, including why backup is not enough, how to create a disaster recovery plan, best-practice DR testing and DR as a service Continue Reading
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News
28 Jul 2021
Almost half unaware of GP data-sharing plans
Around half of adults in England – approximately 20 million people – remain unaware of the scope of the NHS GPDPR programme, prompting calls for a public education campaign Continue Reading
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News
13 Jul 2021
Secureworks sets up in EU datacentre for XDR services
New datacentre location helps Secureworks’ customers meet EU data residency requirements Continue Reading
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News
23 Jun 2021
City of York picks Barracuda Networks for data protection
York Council needed to refresh its backup service to bring new security protections after it went ‘all-in’ on Microsoft Office 365 Continue Reading
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Opinion
22 Jun 2021
European ‘chat control’ plans in the name of ‘child safety’ threaten end-to-end encryption
Proposals by European Commission to search for illegal material could mean the end of private messaging and emails Continue Reading
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News
18 Jun 2021
UK taskforce calls for cutting GDPR protections
The UK’s Taskforce on Innovation, Growth and Regulatory Reform has recommended scrapping safeguards against automated decision-making contained in the General Data Protection Regulation Continue Reading
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News
15 Jun 2021
The Security Interviews: How to build a government model to ‘hack for good’
Kyle Hanslovan started Huntress to give back after a career in the intelligence sector. After US authorities took action to help people hit by the Microsoft Exchange attacks, we discussed how governments can ‘hack for good’ Continue Reading
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Feature
14 Jun 2021
Europe’s proposed AI regulation falls short on protecting rights
The European Commission’s proposal for artificial intelligence regulation focuses on creating a risk-based, market-led approach replete with self-assessments, transparency procedures and technical standards, but critics warn it falls short of being able to protect people’s fundamental rights and mitigating the technology’s worst abuses Continue Reading
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Feature
10 Jun 2021
How the pandemic changed backup
The Covid-19 pandemic forced big changes in how people work – we look at impacts on backup, including increased reliance on the cloud, plus security and compliance vulnerabilities and ransomware Continue Reading
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News
09 Jun 2021
Cohesity brings DataProtect backup-as-a-service to Europe via AWS
Scale-out backup appliance pioneer adds backup-as-a-service from a virtual machine on customer premises Continue Reading
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News
08 Jun 2021
NHS Digital delays data collection plans until September
NHS Digital has postponed its proposed collection of GP data for two months, to allow more time for the public to understand the process and opt out if wanted Continue Reading
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News
08 Jun 2021
National data guardian calls for dialogue on NHS Digital GP plans
The UK’s national data guardian says it is important the public has clarity on how their confidential medical information will be used and kept secure under NHS data-sharing plans Continue Reading
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News
07 Jun 2021
EU privacy chief investigates use of US cloud services
Use of Amazon and Microsoft’s cloud services by public sector bodies in the European Union is being scrutinised by the bloc’s privacy watchdog Continue Reading
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News
07 Jun 2021
IBM pushes back against US government data requests
Technology giant IBM says the US government has ‘no jurisdiction’ to request data from its European entities Continue Reading
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News
07 Jun 2021
Campaigners plan legal action over NHS data sharing
Privacy coalition aims to force NHS Digital to push back its plans to scrape medical information on millions of patients into a central database Continue Reading
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Opinion
07 Jun 2021
NHS Digital’s GP data-scraping plan must be publicised and delayed
The UK government must launch a national awareness campaign and delay this month’s planned GP data slurp, say privacy consultants Ben Rapp and Sara Newman Continue Reading
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News
04 Jun 2021
UK immigration exemption in Data Protection Act found unlawful
Court of Appeal rules immigration exemption unlawful, but further hearings will follow to decide what remedies must be put in place Continue Reading
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News
04 Jun 2021
BCS: Lack of communication over NHS GPDPR ‘astonishing’
The Chartered Institute for IT has warned that millions of people are not being properly informed of NHS Digital plans to harvest their data Continue Reading
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News
03 Jun 2021
Tories fined over email data protection breaches
The Conservative Party broke the law by failing to properly keep records of who had unsubscribed from its mailing list Continue Reading
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News
01 Jun 2021
Exagrid pays $2.6m to Conti ransomware attackers
Backup appliance specialist hit by Conti ransomware in May with cyber criminals downloading employee and customer data, confidential contracts and source code Continue Reading
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News
28 May 2021
Privacy experts concerned over NHS data collection plans
Security and data privacy experts warn NHS Digital that its data collection plans could increase risk and cause a public backlash Continue Reading
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News
26 May 2021
More data stolen in January 2021 than in all of 2017, says report
The volume of data being stolen through breaches is growing steadily and shows no sign of slowing, according to a report from Imperva Continue Reading
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News
25 May 2021
Oil and gas firm halves backup licence cost with Hycu move
Summit E&P made a strategic move to Nutanix hyper-converged and away from NetApp and VMware and wanted backup that could handle virtual machines and physical servers Continue Reading
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News
25 May 2021
Threat of group GDPR legal action haunts CISOs
The vast majority of security leaders questioned for a new report say they are concerned about the possibility of group legal settlements against them following a serious data breach Continue Reading
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News
25 May 2021
Industry reflects on three years of GDPR
Looking back on 12 tumultuous months, we assess how GDPR has weathered the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic and Brexit, and consider what the coming year may hold for data protection Continue Reading
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E-Zine
24 May 2021
Making data an asset, not a threat
In this week’s Computer Weekly, we examine the latest developments in the UK government’s National Data Strategy and what it means for the economy. Our latest buyer’s guide explains the emerging technologies around computational storage. And we look at the advances in customer experience management during the pandemic. Read the issue now. Continue Reading
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News
19 May 2021
Reports of stolen Irish health service data being leaked online
Leaking of deeply confidential and personal information on patient healthcare marks a new low for the criminal Conti gang Continue Reading
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News
18 May 2021
Microsoft EU Data Boundary dubbed ‘smoke and mirrors’
Data protection experts claim Microsoft’s decision to create an EU Data Boundary is a tacit admission that it routinely transfers and processes the personal data of European citizens outside the bloc Continue Reading
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News
06 May 2021
Scammers accidentally reveal fake Amazon review data
More than 13 million records relating to an organised fake review scam have been found on an unsecured ElasticSearch database, implicating hundreds of thousands of people in unethical behaviour Continue Reading
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News
29 Apr 2021
G7 countries to cooperate on digital regulation
Digital and technology ministers outline their agenda for how technology can be used to facilitate the post-Covid recovery, signalling closer collaboration in key areas of the digital economy Continue Reading
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News
28 Apr 2021
NHS App to serve as vaccine passport for foreign holidays
Existing NHS App will have vaccine passport functionality added to it, transport secretary confirms Continue Reading
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Feature
28 Apr 2021
Backup failure: Four key areas where backups go wrong
We look at the key ways that backups can fail – via software issues, hardware problems, trouble in the infrastructure and good old human error – and suggest ways to mitigate them Continue Reading
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News
27 Apr 2021
Leaky Azure storage account puts software developer IP at risk
Source code for multiple products was left exposed in an unsecured Microsoft Azure cloud storage account, say researchers, but attributing responsibility for the error has proved difficult Continue Reading
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News
15 Apr 2021
Ireland’s DPC launches probe into Facebook leak
The Irish Data Protection Commission has launched an ‘own volition’ inquiry into the leak of data from 500 million Facebook profiles Continue Reading
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Definition
14 Apr 2021
compliance risk
Compliance risk is an organization's potential exposure to legal penalties, financial forfeiture and material loss, resulting from its failure to act in accordance with industry laws and regulations, internal policies or prescribed best practices. Continue Reading
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Opinion
12 Apr 2021
What has a year of home working meant for the DPO?
Byron Shirley of The Compliance Space explores how the role of the data protection officer has changed in the past 12 months Continue Reading
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News
06 Apr 2021
Facebook data leak could be outside scope of GDPR
Regulators may be unable to do much about leaked data on 533 million Facebook users, as it seems to have been stolen before GDPR came into force Continue Reading
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News
29 Mar 2021
Backup survey: UK councils’ downtimes five times longer than average
Backup product supplier Veeam’s freedom of information request finds councils’ average downtime is seven hours and that backup and disaster recovery testing is not done frequently Continue Reading
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Feature
26 Mar 2021
Backup appliances the hot topic for Pas-de-Calais fire brigade
With requirements for strict, long-duration backup and archiving, French fire brigade set out to replace optical media with a StorageCraft appliance and disaster-proof storage Continue Reading
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Feature
25 Mar 2021
The 3-2-1 backup rule: Has cloud made it obsolete?
The 3-2-1 backup rule was made for small-scale use in the pre-cloud era when tape still ruled. Is it relevant in the 2020s, or can we repurpose its fundamental principles? Continue Reading
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News
24 Mar 2021
IWM uses StorCycle to free capacity for all-flash SAN upgrade
Imperial War Museums set to embark on unstructured data archiving project that will archive cold data to tape and free up capacity for a move to IntelliFlash all-flash SAN Continue Reading
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News
18 Mar 2021
Survey: Backup failures hit a high as pandemic working hits home
Veeam survey finds distributed working plus operations that span on-prem and the cloud the background to high numbers of failures in backup and restore, with 40% of SLAs not met Continue Reading
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News
17 Mar 2021
Digital Green Certificate proposed for travel in Europe
Digital Green Certificates will supposedly help re-establish freedom of movement within the European Union Continue Reading
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News
16 Mar 2021
Government calls for input into Covid-19 vaccine passports
Evidence gathering exercise will inform the development of the UK’s proposed Covid-19 vaccine passport scheme Continue Reading
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News
12 Mar 2021
CW Innovation Awards: Fighting fake Covid-19 vaccines with blockchain
A blockchain-based system developed by Singapore-based Zuellig Pharma can help governments and healthcare providers weed out fake vaccines and manage vaccine distribution and administration Continue Reading
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Opinion
11 Mar 2021
Why the London Data Charter could be a foundation stone in the city’s recovery
London First’s director of connectivity and competitiveness, David Lutton, explains why data is at the core of the capital’s recovery plan Continue Reading
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News
11 Mar 2021
UK digital regulators set out plans to strengthen cooperation
Digital Regulation Cooperation Forum outlines plans for the coming year, marking a shift towards a more collaborative regulatory approach Continue Reading
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Feature
11 Mar 2021
Top five threats to compliance during the pandemic
We survey the top five pandemic compliance threats – remote working, Covid tracking, criminal exploits, compliance measures slipping, and heightened enforcement to come Continue Reading
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News
10 Mar 2021
Met Police chooses Capgemini as strategic IT infrastructure services provider
Capgemini has a history of providing the force with day-to-day technology services, and will now deliver its infrastructure services under the Pegasus programme Continue Reading
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Feature
04 Mar 2021
Five ways that disaster recovery changes in a pandemic
Covid-19 has changed IT. Previously, working remotely was a business continuity measure, but now it is the norm. That means disaster recovery has to adapt to new risks and new ways to respond Continue Reading
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News
04 Mar 2021
Veritas looks beyond NetBackup for growth in ASEAN
Veritas has seen increased demand for its availability tools as it looks to address backup and recovery requirements from cloud, database and VMware workloads Continue Reading
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News
03 Mar 2021
UK’s Arkivum up for €4.8m EU science data archive project
CERN-led multi-petabyte scale research data archive bid will use Google cloud and compete with AWS-based and open source designs from other providers Libnova and Onedata Continue Reading
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News
03 Mar 2021
SME backup: Card maker ditches tape-only for Nakivo 3-2-1 setup
IG Design Group gains a modern backup regime with data held on disk, in the cloud and long-term on tape in a move that has helped it to slash backup and restore times Continue Reading
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News
24 Feb 2021
Arcserve and StorageCraft merger aims for ‘single pane of glass’
Arcserve and StorageCraft bring a lot of similarities but enough differences for their backers to bet on with their merger, with unifying management between product sets the only priority currently stated Continue Reading
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News
24 Feb 2021
Veeam v11 adds continuous data protection and cloud archive
Backup specialist’s annual upgrade brings continuous data protection to offer better RPOs and RTOs than existing snapshot functionality and without impact on running processes Continue Reading
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News
21 Feb 2021
Dell to invest $50m in Singapore innovation hub
Dell Technologies’ global innovation hub will house a research and development lab and other facilities to drive development and adoption of emerging technologies Continue Reading