An update on GDPR. What’s Changed?

As we get closer and closer towards the 2018 GDPR deadline (25th may 2018), there seems to be more and more anxiety as to what these regulations will ultimately mean to ad tech companies, marketers, and publishers. One thing is for sure, GDPR will be a universal law that applies to everybody in Europe, however, it may not be policed equally. Why? Well strangely enough, 28 countries will enforce the rules on their own terms. An example to take into consideration would be to take a look at Germany. Experts expect Germany to be tougher on data protection rules because data protection is handled at a state level.

With that being said, whenever new regulations surface, along come thousands of articles speculating with false claims and accusations about said rules. This blog will in turn try to give more up to date information than the previous blog, and also try to debunk some false information and myths circling around GDPR.

How will it work? 

Well this is where most companies are confused. Some companies have considered running country-specific strategies, whilst others such as AppNexus have been considering a strategy for Europe as a whole. The challenge of course is that a country specific strategy would be easier to implement as companies would only have to adhere to one set of regulations, however a strategy for the whole of Europe means that they would have to tick everyone’s boxes, but in turn have more data and revenue. It’s a very important decision that some companies choose to make, whether to be a jack-of-all-trades or the master of one?

Is what’s being reported about the fines true?

This topic has arguably been the most discussed about since the announcement of the GDPR rules. Just to recap, if companies do not comply with the new laws, they may face fines of up to 4% of their yearly revenues or a maximum £17 Million. In an interview with Digiday, Robert Streeter, News UK’s data protection officer helped iron out a few details about misinformation. Long story short, in the UK, companies will only be liable to fines if they bend the laws or fail to notify the Information Commissioner’s office of data privacy breaches, which “affect people’s rights and freedoms”.

The IOC will have the power to hand out such huge fines, however they will only do so as a last resort. Other methods of punishment will be warnings, corrective orders and reprimands. You may be thinking well that’s nothing to major companies if they just get a slap on the wrist, however in this day and age, reputation and perception can be just as damning as a massive fine.

GDPR only applies to companies in the European Union.

As stated earlier, we’ve written a previous blog on GDPR, and this point was covered, but we can’t stress enough how important this point is. NO. GDPR doesn’t just affect countries in the European Union, and Brexit will not make British companies exempt with having to also comply. GDPR Will affect any company in the world, (including the United States) that offer goods or services to consumers in the EU, irrespective of where their offices and servers are based.

GDPR is great for the duopoly.

It wouldn’t be a true blog without mentioning the giants Google and Facebook. Naturally, there are a few theories floating around stating that the two companies are eager for these regulations to come into play and will stem to make some money on this. Jason Kint, CEO of Digital Content Next stated that “Anyone who believes their lobbyists’ myth that privacy regulation will only help Google and Facebook is having the wool pulled over their eyes.” Fairly conclusive!

To conclude, companies have less than 7 months to make sure that they’re fully compliable with GDPR. We’ve identified what will happen if they don’t comply, however why take a the risk and headache to do it by yourself? Evolok will fully comply with GDPR, as we have clients operating in 6 continents and are of course based in the UK. Whilst having a cloud view of customer data, therefore reducing the risk of breaches and increasing security, these customers also have the ability to increase their monetisation efforts with our software. Contact us for a demo.