By Lynette Whiley
Canadian companies transacting with Europe (and now California) are vulnerable if they don’t address their data privacy and security policies. The threat of GDPR, PIPEDA and now CCPA is sufficient to cause major Canadian multi-nationals to stop and review their current data privacy and security policies. GDPR fines alone have increased from CA$600,000 to over $500 million in 2019.
One of the most affected industries is financial services. GDPR isn’t just about the use of sensitive data, it is also about handling and storage of the data. One of the big five banks in Canada were looking to ramp up in the cloud and due to this increased exposure, wanted to ensure that any stored sensitive data would meet (new) compliance regulations. This bank recently failed their own internal data privacy audit and after a comprehensive review, concluded that only an external solution would meet the new requirements. They needed a solution that would integrate seamlessly with any legacy installation, that would not cause major disruption to daily transactions and that was compliant both here and in Europe. The decision was made to implement DataStealth from Datex.
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Since 2013, 14 billion data records have been lost or stolen. Only 4 per cent of these breaches were “secure” where encryption was used and the stolen data rendered useless. DataStealth focuses on the remaining 96 per cent. “The DataStealth solution by Datex is totally seamless,” said Allan Kennedy, director of sales at Datex. “No changes to architecture, dataflow or business processes. It is truly plug-and-play software which Kennedy likens to a pane of glass; technology agnostic, operating at the network level and best of all employees and customers don’t know it is there.” Kennedy is adamant that “DataStealth is the difference between thinking that your business is secure and knowing it.”
The Mississauga Ont.-based company has been in business since 1991. In 2014 they found their niche with the ramping up of global PCI compliance requirements. Clients were searching not only for software that would protect sensitive customer data but that could also easily pass an annual PCI audit. The solution didn’t exist and so Datex built DataStealth from scratch, thus giving its creators full control and flexibility and a serious competitive advantage.
Datex partnered up with Softchoice, one of their strategic business partners to collaborate on this project. Being an approved provider to the bank, Softchoice was an excellent channel partner. Their intimate understanding of both the bank’s requirements and language as well as the DataStealth offering resulted in smooth negotiation and execution of the contract. These two partners installed and executed the solution. “It was the perfect fit for us,” said Don Kayser, senior account executive at Softchoice. “We have a long-term relationship with both the bank and Datex which enabled a smooth deployment. The unique encryption of data before it goes into the network results in illegible results to any breach.”
After three short months, the bank is extremely satisfied with the solution and is now looking to invest in the solution across even more lines of business especially in the stringent European market.
Global data privacy legislation affects any Canadian organisation who transacts with out-of-country customers. The potential financial impact could be devastating regardless of the size of the company and anyone who delays attending to their security and the safety of their customers’ sensitive data is putting their company at risk. Finding a partner who can deploy with the least amount of disruption is available with DataStealth.
The gold award winner for this category is IDG Technologies Inc.