Data Protection Day 2021: Rising to the Occasion
Data Protection Day is celebrated internationally on January 28th. Did you know your privacy and data are protected by Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights? Read on if you’re curious about how Visma Connect strives to be a leader in data protection.
Privacy at Visma Connect
Visma Connect has a Privacy Officer and a Data Protection Officer (DPO). Our privacy officer ensures that everyone at Visma Connect is aware of privacy issues by organising privacy awareness sessions. On their first day, all new employees at Visma Connect get privacy training. Our employees are also enrolled in a mandatory privacy e-learning course, which takes place on a regular basis. Our DPO is registered with the Dutch Data Protection Authority and works closely with the privacy officer to ensure all data protection measures are implemented with care.
Our company is subject to European privacy laws, most importantly the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). We take GDPR compliance very seriously. For example, by ensuring we have data processing agreements in place, as well as a transparent privacy policy. These and other privacy measures are important to us because Visma Connect processes a lot of personal data on behalf of our customers. This makes it crucial for us to make our products and services as privacy-friendly as possible. “Privacy by design” and “privacy by default” are our mottos.
When it comes to privacy incidents, fortunately, we have not had many. But when they occur, we mitigate their impact as fast as possible. The privacy and security incident response routine is operated by a dedicated team that assists the whole process, from initial stakeholder notifications to hosting “lessons learned” sessions.
Our commitment to privacy doesn't stop here. In fact, we’re helping other companies set new standards for data protection - in true Visma Connect fashion.
Our commitment to the Data Pro Code
The Data Pro Code is a code of conduct for privacy initiated by NLdigital, a trade association for companies in IT. Initially, this certification was developed for organisations that had up to 50 employees. We thought that the Data Pro Code could also be of great value to our work. So, in cooperation with NLdigital and some other pioneers, we developed a certification process for bigger companies and were one of the first organisations with over 50 employees to get certified. In 2020, this code of conduct also became the first to be approved by the Dutch Data Protection Authority, according to article 40 of GDPR. For us, it’s not just important to “follow the rules.” We have a strong security culture and foster privacy as a behavior within our company.
We hope this inspires other companies to follow suit. If you have any questions about our privacy policy or measures we take to protect personal data, feel free to contact us.
