Data protection regulations and compliance

VAT software supplier exposed data of millions

Eight million sales records belonging to UK and EU consumers left exposed due to misconfigured server Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Top four compliance considerations for SMEs

We look at the key data compliance regulations that affect smaller companies – such as GDPR, the Data Protection Act, PCI-DSS and PECR – and some key industry-specific frameworks. Continue Reading

Podcast: ‘The human element’ in compliance at RSA 2020

We review RSA 2020 and discuss the human element in compliance, plus network and data management, trust, Covid-19 and its implications for organisations, and GDPR and CCPA Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

Biometrics ethics group takes evidence on public-private use of facial recognition

Collaboration between police forces and private entities on facial recognition technology comes under scrutiny by the Home Office’s Biometrics and Forensics Ethics Group Continue Reading

By

• Sebastian Klovig Skelton, Data & ethics editor

Clearview hack fuels debate over facial recognition

Customers of Clearview AI, a controversial startup that scrapes and sells billions of photos of people from social media to police forces, have found themselves at the centre of a major data breach Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Is the EU better equipped than the US to supervise the use of facial recognition?

Clearview AI can be an indispensable tool to reinforce national security, but there are many risks associated with the use of facial recognition technology that the EU might be better equipped to deal with than the US Continue Reading

By

• Mathilde Gérot, Signature Litigation

Thai university to roll out data protection certification

Thailand’s National Institute of Development Administration is offering a certification programme to get organisations ready for the country’s data protection regime Continue Reading

By

• Aaron Tan, Informa TechTarget

Labour condemns Google data plans

Shadow digital minister Chi Onwurah challenges the government to stop Google’s plans to move UK user data out of the EU Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Google plans to send Brits’ data to US after Brexit

Move puts British user data beyond the reach of the EU’s GDPR, makes it more accessible to UK and US law enforcement agencies, and has prompted anger Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Blasé directors put business data at risk

The higher up within a business you go, the more likely you are to find people intentionally leaking confidential data, says Egress Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Veeam Availability Suite v10 adds NAS backup and cloud tiering

Availability Suite is mostly about consolidating the company’s data management platform idea, but it has added incremental forever NAS backup, cloud tiering and recovery to vSphere Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

Police use of facial recognition ‘unjustifiable’, says Scottish Justice Committee

Members of the Scottish Parliament have said police use of live facial recognition technology is “not fit for purpose” Continue Reading

By

• Sebastian Klovig Skelton, Data & ethics editor

Veeam pushes subscription licensing in cloud-centric ‘Act II’

Backup specialist wants to “win the cloud” as it pushes towards a cloud-focused vision that includes pay-for-what-you-use and multicloud after its acquisition last month Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

Acronis CEO bullish as specialist goes beyond backup

Acronis is set to launch Cyber Protect as it rides a wave of confidence based on increasing revenues and investor funding. Will the backup-plus-cyber protection calculation pay off? Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

Podcast: How to boost staff awareness of compliance

Employee awareness of compliance, of the laws and regulations that affect your business, is vital, in some cases even mandatory. We look at the key ways to achieve it Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

Top four compliance considerations for SMEs

We look at the key data compliance regulations that affect smaller companies – such as GDPR, the Data Protection Act, PCI-DSS and PECR – and some key industry-specific frameworks Continue Reading

By

• Stephen Pritchard

Data privacy benefits outweigh spend, says Cisco

Cisco’s 2020 data privacy study shows organisations can generate substantial returns on their data privacy and protection spending Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Disaster recovery failover choices: Synchronous mirrors, P2V and the cloud

We survey the key options in disaster recovery: whether to failover to an on-site location or off-site facility. We also look at the cloud as an option in disaster recovery Continue Reading

By

• Stephen Pritchard

Six disaster recovery pitfalls and how to avoid them

We look at some key pitfalls in disaster recovery, such as failing to plan, not testing the plan, not protecting backups, poor communication and neglecting the human element Continue Reading

By

• Stephen Pritchard

Spread of Kubernetes spurs backup and disaster recovery products

Growth of containerised applications brings with it the need to back up and provide disaster recovery. But what do you need to protect, and who provides the products? Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

Consent and GDPR: at least get the basics right!

Why do companies find it so hard to get their heads around even the basics of GDPR compliance? I’m not even thinking here of techie stuff like not getting hacked, and not losing a laptop full of ... Continue Reading

By

• Bryan Betts, Freeform Dynamics

Exposed AWS buckets again implicated in multiple data leaks

A series of data leaks in the past week have once again implicated poorly secured Amazon S3 buckets, which are supposed to be private by default Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

GDPR nets more than €100m in fines, with more to come

Fines totalling €114m have already been collected under GDPR, and this figure will spike in 2020 if the UK regulator succeeds in imposing record fines on BA and Marriott Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Scottish police roll out controversial data extraction technology

The introduction of new mobile phone data extraction terminals to Police Scotland will go ahead despite concerns that the use of the technology could be unlawful Continue Reading

By

• Sebastian Klovig Skelton, Data & ethics editor

Thailand gets ready for data protection law

Thailand’s personal data protection law comes into effect in May 2020, subjecting organisations to new rules that safeguard the personal data of individuals Continue Reading

By

• Aaron Tan, Informa TechTarget

Threat landscape grew in complexity in 2019, no respite in sight

Check Point’s annual state of security report shares some 2019 trends and looks ahead to 2020 Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

$5bn buy-out set to make backup giant Veeam a US company

Veeam’s founders are out as investment fund gets its hands on a pioneer of virtual machine backup. Now it will be a US company and eligible to target US government customers Continue Reading

By

• Yann Serra, LeMagIT

Don’t become the next Travelex: Get ready for ransomware

With Travelex’s IT still in disarray and banks and travellers left without access to funds more than a week after it was hit by a ransomware attack, we ask what others can learn from the foreign exchange services company’s response to the incident Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

DRaaS decisions: Key choices in disaster recovery as a service

We examine the key decisions when considering DRaaS. Whether to go full self-service, assisted or managed will depend on what you need to protect and your in-house resources Continue Reading

By

• Stephen Pritchard

New GDPR service aims to ease compliance challenges

Security consultants claim their software platform will address a pressing need for an effective and efficient means of complying with data protection rules Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Five ways that backup has changed since the days of tape

Back in the day, all this was tape, but times have changed, with cloud-to-cloud backup, cloud storage, virtual and physical backup appliances and myriad endpoint hardware Continue Reading

By

• Rene Millman

California’s CCPA an opportunity for security industry to do better

California’s consumer protection and data privacy laws came into effect on 1 January 2020, and present a golden opportunity for the cyber security practitioners Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

CW Europe: Deutsche Bank creates innovation division

German banking giant Deutsche Bank is opening a division focused on innovation which will be led by former SAP executive Bernd Leukert. It will create agile teams with business and infrastructure divisions leading teams of technologists, using agile principles. Also read why China’s Huawei has offered governments an anti-industrial espionage commitment, and how software robots are helping social workers in Sweden. Continue Reading

Public sector still losing user devices in high numbers

The Ministry of Justice has lost 354 smartphones, PCs, laptops and tablets in the past 12 months, according to a Freedom of Information request, and other government departments are in the same boat Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Survey finds most firms don’t respond to GDPR requests in time

Most organisations do not respond to requests for GDPR data in the one month allowed, while many return incorrect data. The education sector does best, but the public sector lags behind Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

Five essential steps to a sound disaster recovery plan

We walk through the key steps to develop a disaster recovery plan – from risk assessment and setting recovery objectives, to the plan itself and a testing regime to keep it fresh Continue Reading

By

• Stephen Pritchard

Get ready for CCPA: Implications for UK businesses

The California Consumer Privacy Act, a wide-ranging data privacy and consumer protection law, comes into effect on 1 January 2020. How does CCPA differ from the EU GDPR regulations and what are the responsibilities for UK businesses operating in the US? Continue Reading

By

• Peter Ray Allison

Mystery surrounds leak of four billion user records

Threat researchers uncover four billion user records on a wide-open Elasticsearch server but who left them there is a mystery Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

SME disaster recovery made easy with cloud, hybrid and HCI

Disaster recovery is a lot easier for small businesses than it used to be, with use of the cloud, hybrid cloud, physical and virtual appliances, and hyper-converged infrastructure all among the choices on offer Continue Reading

By

• Stephen Pritchard

Businesses failing to wipe data from old endpoints

Organisations are not taking adequate precautions to sanitise data held on endpoints when refreshing their PC or mobile device estates Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

How Slack is going beyond messaging in enterprise play

Deeper integrations with business applications and data residency support are part of Slack’s broader strategy to penetrate deeper into the enterprise Continue Reading

By

• Aaron Tan, Informa TechTarget

ASEAN regulatory sandbox will promote cross-border data flows

The Regulatory Pilot Space will offer ASEAN businesses a safe test environment to provide digital services across the region while complying with data privacy rules Continue Reading

By

• Aaron Tan, Informa TechTarget

Taking responsibility for security in the cloud

From accidental leaks to full-on data breaches, maintaining security across cloud services is becoming a headache for enterprises. What questions should organisations be asking of their cloud service provider and, ultimately, whose responsibility is cloud security anyway? Continue Reading

By

• Peter Ray Allison

Security Think Tank: Secure the cloud when negotiating contracts

Misconfigured cloud environments are increasingly identified as the source of damaging data breaches and leaks, raising serious questions for enterprises. Where does responsibility for data security in the cloud lie, and how can security professionals best work with their teams and cloud providers to resolve the problem? Continue Reading

By

• Petra Wenham

ICO says UK police must ‘slow down’ use of facial recognition

The Information Commissioner’s Office is calling for a statutory code of practice to govern how police in the UK deploy live facial recognition technology while controversy surrounding its use continues Continue Reading

By

• Sebastian Klovig Skelton , Senior reporter

Security Think Tank: In the cloud, the buck stops with you

Misconfigured cloud environments are increasingly identified as the source of damaging data breaches and leaks, raising serious questions for enterprises. Where does responsibility for data security in the cloud lie, and how can security professionals best work with their teams and cloud providers to resolve the problem? Continue Reading

By

• Mike Gillespie

NordVPN enlists ethical hackers, launches bug bounty programme

Breached consumer VPN supplier details steps it is taking to shore up its cyber security posture after an unknown actor gained access to one of its servers Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

How to use multi-cloud data management and protection

Data protection vendors are continuing to add more data management features in their products. How does this convergence affect multi-cloud environments? Continue Reading

By

• Krista Case, The Futurum Group

Equifax lawsuit offers more evidence against passwords

Equifax’s internal security policies were a mess and directly led to one of the largest recorded data breaches in history, according to a lawsuit, demonstrating fundamental insecurities inherent in the use of passwords Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

PCI DSS: Credit card data and what to expect from version 4.0

We preview October’s PCI Europe Community Meeting where attendees will discuss credit card payment data, with topics covered likely to include the cloud and point-to-point encryption Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

Security Think Tank: Get basic security policy right, and the rest will follow

Paying attention to basic aspects of cyber security such as policy and permission will give you a sold base to build from Continue Reading

By

• Petra Wenham

Dutch group works on digitising collaborator archives created in aftermath of World War 2

Experiments have been carried out to ascertain the best technology to open up the analogue archives of the Central Archive of Special Justice in the Netherlands Continue Reading

By

• Kim Loohuis

Singapore outlines initiatives to tackle OT and IoT security

The Cyber Security Agency of Singapore has developed a blueprint to secure operational technology systems in critical sectors, among other measures to secure cyber-physical systems and the internet of things Continue Reading

By

• Aaron Tan, Informa TechTarget

GDPR compliance: Whose job is it and is it really possible?

Nobody seems to have a good handle on business GDPR compliance, how many businesses are compliant, or indeed what compliance really is, but according to security experts, it very much depends on who you talk to Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Basic data and skills needed to fix UK social care

Foundations need to be in place to save the social care system from collapse, and NHSX needs to step up to the task, according to a Doteveryone report Continue Reading

By

• Angelica Mari

Universities tempting targets for cyber criminals, warns NCSC

As hundreds of thousands of students prepare for the new academic year, universities have been warned that they are at high risk of cyber attack Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Northwestern cuts storage costs in half with Komprise

Komprise’s Deep Analytics helps university classify and migrate research data to cheaper disk and cloud as it cuts storage costs from $1.1m to $680,000 per annum Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

Ecuador citizens’ data breach holds lessons for enterprises

What caused the mass breach of Ecuadorian citizens’ data, and what can businesses learn from it? Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

GDPR non-compliance worse than feared

Over half of UK businesses do not yet appear to be fully GDPR-compliant, and many have de-prioritised their compliance efforts Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

How APAC firms can slay the storage management beast

The data deluge and compliance requirements are shaping how Asia-Pacific firms are approaching storage management issues in the age of cloud Continue Reading

By

• Aaron Tan, Informa TechTarget

Police use of controversial facial recognition technology deemed lawful

In a landmark hearing, the High Court has ruled that police use of automatic facial recognition technology is lawful, but that it still infringes on privacy rights Continue Reading

By

• Sebastian Klovig Skelton , Senior reporter

Human rights group challenges police over counter-terrorism powers

Bringing into question the effectiveness of terror laws, a report by human rights group Cage highlights poor conviction rates and the discriminatory application of police powers at the border Continue Reading

By

• Sebastian Klovig Skelton, Data & ethics editor

CW Nordics: Copenhagen woos tech startups

Copenhagen offers all the advantages startups need to get off the ground and many are setting up with the intention of staying there for the long haul. Also read how shipping giant Maersk is employing a cloud-first strategy to disrupt competition and build innovation, and why three Finnish banks are sharing a core IT platform. Continue Reading

CW Benelux: Dutch academic hunts the personality behind the hacker

Rutger Leukfeldt, senior researcher on cyber crime at the Netherlands Institute for the Study of Crime and Law Enforcement, is working to help organisations understand the personalities behind criminal hackers. Also in this issue, read about research that shows over half of Dutch organisations admit their knowledge of blockchain is substandard. We also feature an article about ABN Amro’s work with researchers to explore how quantum computing can be used to secure online banking. Continue Reading

ICO joins international call for transparency around Facebook’s Libra currency

Data protection regulators from around the world have signed a statement raising privacy concerns about Libra Continue Reading

By

• Bill Goodwin, Computer Weekly
• Sebastian Klovig Skelton, Data & ethics editor

Analytics and GDPR compliance: How to achieve it

Mathieu Gorge, CEO of Vigitrust, looks at technologies such as pseudonymisation that can help organisations stay GDPR-compliant while gaining value from analytics on customer data Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

UN resolution ignores special rapporteur’s call for halt to spyware sales

UN’s Human Rights Council adopts resolution to explore the impact of new and emerging digital technologies on human rights, but the text ignores a damning report by the council’s own expert on freedom of expression Continue Reading

By

• Sebastian Klovig Skelton, Data & ethics editor

BA/Marriott GDPR fines: What they were for and how to avoid them

We talk to Mathieu Gorge, CEO of Vigitrust, about the BA and Marriott GDPR fines and what organisations can do to ensure they achieve compliance with GDPR and similar regulations Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

King’s College London breached GDPR by handing students’ information to police, review finds

Following a review of its security arrangements, King’s College London has referred itself to the Information Commissioner’s Office after improperly sharing sensitive information about politically active students with police Continue Reading

By

• Sebastian Klovig Skelton, Data & ethics editor

French baby store modernises backup as Veeam handles 150TB a night

France-based maternity, baby and children’s store Orchestra needed to share IT resources between 700 points of sale across multiple time zones, and backup for 100 applications Continue Reading

By

• Yann Serra, LeMagIT

Cloud snapshots and backups: How to protect data in the cloud

You often need more data protection than native cloud services will give. But should you choose backup or snapshots? And what about third-party backup in the cloud? Continue Reading

By

• Paul Stringfellow, Gardner Systems

Veritas bundles NetBackup into Enterprise Data Services Platform

Backup giant wraps key product into data management wrapper that adds search, index and data classification Information Studio plus InfoScale software-defined storage Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

Unstructured data compliance: Obstacles and solutions

Stored unstructured data could be a black hole full of unknown risk. We look at the key dangers to compliance in unstructured data and some ways of mitigating the risks Continue Reading

By

• Stephen Pritchard

CW APAC: Buyer’s guide to NVMe storage

In this handbook, Computer Weekly looks at how NVMe storage is gaining popularity in the race to reduce latency and speed up application performance, and throws light on seven misconceptions around the use of NVMe. Continue Reading

GDPR and backup: What have we learned in one year?

A customer's deletion request continues to be a sticking point regarding backup and GDPR compliance. Learn guidance about this issue and others, following GDPR's first birthday. Continue Reading

By

• Nick Cavalancia, Techvangelism

Is ‘Brexit effect’ to blame for drop in UK data management investments?

Research from data backup software supplier Veeam suggests UK C-suite is set to invest much less in data management over the course of the next 12 months than the rest of the world, prompting concerns that Brexit might be to blame Continue Reading

By

• Caroline Donnelly, Senior Editor, UK

ICO to shortlist Sandbox applicants

Privacy watchdog’s Sandbox service aims to help develop innovative and beneficial products and services that are privacy compliant Continue Reading

By

• Warwick Ashford, Senior analyst

V.Pharma swaps Data Domain for Quantum and cuts backup costs

Belgian pharmacy’s Data Domains had reached end-of-life and it wanted to remain in-budget. Quantum DXi worked out a lot cheaper and easy to manage, with good support Continue Reading

By

• Yann Serra, LeMagIT

A cloud compliance checklist for the GDPR age

 Continue Reading

JetStream DR cloud replication aims to make backup redundant

JetStream’s IO Filter allows for continuous replication to the cloud of VMware virtual machines and virtual disks instead of scheduled snapshots or backups, and with a near-zero RPO Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

Podcast: The Computer Weekly Downtime Upload – Episode 11

In this week’s episode of The Computer Weekly Downtime Upload podcast, the team discuss Google’s forthcoming cloud conference, how tech can be used to boost social inclusion, while data analytics is being hailed as a means of assisting MI5 with with its terrorism detection work Continue Reading

By

• Caroline Donnelly, Senior Editor, UK

Cranfield gets Rubrik backup plus Nutanix in drive to the cloud

Research-led university goes hyper-converged across the board with Rubrik backup appliances and Nutanix in a move to rationalise on-site physical needs and drive to the cloud Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

Commvault adds “tape killer” AWS Glacier Deep Archive cold storage

Backup provider to offer 1-cent-a-gigabyte AWS Glacier Deep Archive as a target in a move that mirrors a trend towards the cloud and away from tape among Commvault customers Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

Cohesity plans to put backup data to good use

Cohesity’s DataPlatform now makes use of previously dormant backup data with analytics to provide business value and to tackle threats such as ransomware Continue Reading

By

• Yann Serra, LeMagIT

MySpace data loss: Botched server migration prompts user concerns over fate of lost songs

Social networking forerunner MySpace confirms server migration caused the loss of content uploaded to its site before 2015 Continue Reading

By

• Caroline Donnelly, Senior Editor, UK

Veeam’s business soars in APAC, acquisitions on the cards

The backup, recovery and data management hotshot expects to grow its APAC business by about 40% this year, with an eye on acquisitions in adjacent market segments Continue Reading

By

• Aaron Tan, Informa TechTarget

Aptare buy to add turbo-charged analytics to Veritas

Veritas announces acquisition of Aptare, in a move that will boost the backup giant’s analytics offer with inclusion of Aptare IT analytics in NetBackup and Backup Exec Continue Reading

By

• Cyrille Chausson

SME backup products offer diverse routes to the cloud

We take the temperature on cloud-era SME-focused backup products that come as “traditional” software, replication-centric protection environments and hardware appliances Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

Cohesity opens up backup data to analytics and applications

Hybrid-cloud backup appliance provider launches marketplace for applications that can apply intelligence, such as analytics, to data held in backup and secondary data stores Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

A cloud compliance checklist for the GDPR age

The cloud is supposed to make things simpler, but when it comes to compliance, things can get complex. Here is a look at the essential elements of a cloud compliance strategy Continue Reading

Delving into viewer data at the BBC

In this week’s Computer Weekly, we talk to the BBC about how the UK broadcaster is using data analytics to better understand its viewers and grow its audience in the face of competition from the likes of Netflix. We look at how CERN is using IT automation in its quest to unravel the mysteries of the universe. And we examine the impact of GDPR on cloud storage. Read the issue now. Continue Reading

Cloud backup helps ASL Airlines evade ransomware and keep its business flying, says CIO

ASL Airlines took home the Best of Show prize at the Best of VMworld 2018 Awards after detailing how adopting a robust and resilient disaster recovery strategy is helping it evade ransomware threats Continue Reading

By

• Caroline Donnelly, Senior Editor, UK

Backup product approaches vary as they take aim at the cloud

Use of the public cloud for backup data is something all the backup software suppliers provide, but implementations range from simple S3 connections to expansive software offerings Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

Cloud and backup top storage priorities for 2019

Deploying the cloud for primary and secondary storage and backup and archiving project top project priorities in 2019. SAN, NAS and hyper-convergence also prominent Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

A cloud compliance checklist for the GDPR age

The cloud is supposed to make things simpler, but when it comes to compliance, things can get complex. Here is a look at the essential elements of a cloud compliance strategy Continue Reading

By

• Stephen Pritchard

Veeam Cloud Tier adds tiered storage for backups in S3 clouds

Virtualisation backup specialist adds tiering of Veeam Availability Suite data to AWS, Azure and S3-compatible clouds, which can now also be used as a repository for its N2WS cloud-native backup Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

Singapore releases Asia’s first AI governance framework

The model framework will help businesses in Singapore tackle the ethical and governance challenges of AI implementations Continue Reading

By

• Aaron Tan, Informa TechTarget

Podcast: How to get ready for the California Consumer Privacy Act

If you have any customers in California, you need to know about that state’s equivalent to GDPR. Mathieu Gorge of Vigitrust talks through what you need to achieve compliance Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor

Five issues for SMEs to consider when adopting encryption

Encryption is still considered difficult to deploy and use as a data protection method, especially by small businesses, but considering five key factors can make adoption easier, says Becrypt Continue Reading

By

• Warwick Ashford, Senior analyst

Veritas launches Docker container backup in NetBackup

Docker is becoming an industry standard form of application virtualisation, and with that comes the need to back up Docker environments and data. Veritas joins CommVault and Asigra in doing so Continue Reading

By

• Antony Adshead, Storage Editor