Prepare for the AVG!

The AVG is not very new, in fact it has been in effect for two years and we have known since then that the AVG will be applied as of May 25, 2018. The “keep pushing forward” is really over now and it is high time to be prepared. One part of the AVG is particularly important for storing personal data: the right to oblivion. Everyone has the right to have his or her data erased if desired, with few exceptions. Unlike the Personal Data Protection Act, there need not be a reason for this.

As safe as possible or not

However, this right to oblivion is at odds with how our records systems work: to store data as securely as possible. So secure that overwriting or deleting is impossible. And yet even users of Silent Bricks or Silent Cubes should be able to satisfy this right. You also need to make sure that data from all backups is deleted when requested. Tricky, but it has to be done, because the fines are not cheap.

Retention per record

Our WORM systems have traditionally offered the ability to specify a retention time per volume to comply with required privacy laws. For this, you specify in advance how long data will be kept before it is automatically deleted from the database. In accordance with legal requirements, this makes data inaccessible after a certain period of time – that is, forgotten. The latest versions now offer this option on a per-record basis so that retention time can be set individually. Firmware upgrades are available for older installations of our systems, so that the right to oblivion in accordance with the AVG can be guaranteed with all systems ever supplied by us. In the case of WORM archive volumes that may never be deleted, it still applies, of course, that no way can data be made inaccessible here. So those who keep personal data on a volume with no retention time will have to find slightly more cumbersome ways to comply with a request in accordance with the AVG. But we can help with this, too.

Want to know more? Get in touch with us!