5 Steps for Preparing Your Printing Processes for GDPR Deadline

GDPR Personal Data Definition

GDPR is a data protection regulation that applies to all organizations doing business with EU citizens, regardless where the organization is located.

GDPR stands for General Data Protection Regulation, which was proposed by the European Commission to unify data protection for individuals within the EU.

GDPR will govern how companies are collecting, managing, using, and deleting user-identifiable information.

After more than 4 years of preparation, GDPR deadline will come into force on May 25^th, 2018. Many organizations may not realize this, but their printing processes also have to follow GDPR legislation.

Follow these 5 steps to ensure your printing process is compatible with GDPR rules:

1.  Secure Your Printing Infrastructure

To protect your printing processes and systems, you must ensure secure end to end workflow from the moment a print job is issued until it its retrieved by the user at the print tray.

Key infrastructure such as print servers and your internal network must be secured as well.

This can be done through print management solutions which offer an additional layer of print security.

2. Implement Secure Pull Printing

Many companies often throw out hundreds of documents each day that were either not retrieved from the printer or accidentally printed.

The document being printed and thrown out may have personal or confidential information that can compromise the security of the organization or individuals.

Secure Pull Printing offers a simple solution – documents are not printed until the user authenticates themselves at the printer and are present to retrieve it.

This solution will have a positive ROI as unnecessary documents are not being printed, and offers greater security and improved workflow.

Interested in learning more about securing your printing infrastructure? Check out this free webinar on the top three reasons to secure your printing infrastructure now!

3. Establish Rules and Guidelines for Protecting Printed Documents

If the printed document makes it into the hands of the intended recipient it should also be considered what happens after.

• How are the documents stored, how are they disposed of?
• Is confidential information at risk?

Documents which are created and printed outside of the organizations pose a higher risk of information loss or privacy breach.

When an error or data breach occurs, it is also important to be able to track where and when the document was printed, and by whom.

Reporting and tracking capabilities offers a strong incentive for employees to handle sensitive information appropriately.

4. Protect Access to User Information

GDPR requires organizations to protect user’s personal or identifying information and how it is stored.

Organizations must be able to demonstrate to users the data and information stored about them.

Print archiving systems can store information about each user securely – including names, emails, and print job history.

5. The Right to Forget

Another condition of GDPR is that all information about a person must be forgotten when it is no longer necessary or useful.

For example, an ex-employee that doesn’t want the organization to retain his print history. Organizations need to be able to delete the user account and all data associated with it.

Details can be stored in the database for reporting purposes, but without any associated user information.

Once GDPR deadline comes into effect, organizations are required to follow data protection rules which covers the entire spectrum of IT systems, including your print infrastructure.

Is your print environment ready for the GDPR deadline? Check out our FREE whitepaper below to learn more.