What is POPIA?
The mandate of South Africa’s Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA, formerly known as PoPI) is to regulate the processing of personal information. With this Act, data breaches need to be reported by law. Organizations need to develop a clear data protection plan to build trust with customers, drive business growth, and avoid costly penalties. The Act came in to force on July 1, 2020.
Under POPIA, personal information collected and retained by organizations is subject to deletion. It can be difficult to guarantee all personal data is deleted if it has been exported to files outside the central database.
Why should organizations comply with POPIA?
Fortra can help you comply with POPIA
Fortra assists with Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA) compliance in the following ways:
Encryption and Data Security
Under POPIA, organizations are obligated to implement reasonable technical measures to protect personal information from unauthorized access or breaches. Fortra DLP offers robust encryption capabilities for data both in transit and at rest, meaning personal information is protected from unauthorized access, even if data is intercepted or stolen.
Audit Trails and Reporting
POPIA emphasizes the importance of accountability and transparency in handling personal information. Fortra DLP supports this by maintaining detailed audit trails and providing comprehensive reporting on data access and handling activities. These audit logs are crucial for demonstrating compliance during audits and investigations, as they provide a clear record of who accessed personal information, when, and for what purpose.
Data Classification
Fortra’s Data Classification solutions help you comply with POPIA regulations by discovering, identifying, and classifying emails and files at the point of creation or in on-premise and cloud-based file shares to ensure compliant policy enforcement.
Automated Policy Enforcement
Consistent application of data protection policies is a core requirement under POPIA. Fortra DLP automates the enforcement of these policies, ensuring that data protection measures are applied uniformly across all systems and processes.
Incident Detection and Response
POPIA requires organizations to notify the Information Regulator and affected individuals in case of a data breach involving personal information. Fortra DLP facilitates this by providing advanced tools for the rapid detection and response to security incidents. By quickly identifying potential breaches and triggering appropriate responses, organizations can mitigate the impact of a breach and comply with POPIA’s breach notification requirements
Proactive Data Deletion
Under POPIA, personal information collected and retained by organizations is subject to deletion. It can be difficult to guarantee all personal data is deleted if it has been exported to files outside the central database. The metadata that Fortra Data Classification Suite (DCS) applies to files helps enable your organization to locate files that should be deleted for compliance purposes, no matter where they are stored.
How protected is your data?
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