With the GDPR coming into effect in little over two months (25 May 2018), businesses need to make sure they have all the requisite tools in place to meet the legislation's complex requirements. Luckily, Microsoft 365's latest updates are a very big step in the right direction and provide a quick win for small to medium-sized businesses (SMEs) still working towards attaining GDPR compliance for their business.
The Microsoft 365 solution helps businesses assess and manage compliance risks and leverage the cloud to identify, classify, protect, and monitor sensitive data residing in hybrid and heterogeneous environments to support GDPR compliance.
The drive towards GDPR compliance
Within the last month, Microsoft announced that the following Microsoft 365 updates will be rolled out to help businesses protect sensitive data, these include:
Compliance Manager, available for Microsoft Azure, Dynamics 365 and Office 365 Business and Office 365 Enterprise customers within the Cloud
Being able to meet compliance regulations can be extremely challenging for SMEs, there are simply too many variables and not enough people. A tool like Microsoft 365's Compliance Manager, which has been specifically designed to allow businesses to meet complex compliance obligations, lets SMEs run regular risk assessments which in turn provide business owners with a clear understanding of their current compliance position and health.
Compliance Score availability for Office 365
The Compliance Score feature within Compliance Manager makes it easier for businesses to perform regular risk assessments through Microsoft Cloud services. Based on a risk score reference, it can provide more up-to-date information on your compliance performance. The way it works is by assessing the control parameters you've placed on a particular business process (say information transfer policies and procedures). The control is then given a 'risk weighting' based on the level of risk involved if that control were to fail. As you move through each business control your business requires, your overall compliance score will be adjusted accordingly.
Azure Information Protection scanner
The Azure Information Protection scanner within Microsoft 365 helps businesses to protect sensitive data on-premise, in addition to the cloud. It does this by analysing and actioning hybrid and on-premises scenarios that enable your business to adjust policies so as to automatically discover, classify, label and safeguard documents in your on-premises data centres, such as on-premises SharePoint servers. The best part of the scanner is its ability to be configured to regularly scan on-premise data centres based on your own company's policies.
Get started on your GDPR journey with Microsoft 365
No matter what stage your business is at on its journey towards GDPR compliance, the Microsoft Cloud and intelligent compliance solutions within Microsoft 365 can help support your business in reaching compliance. For more information on how to get up and running on Microsoft 365, talk to Advantage today.
Words by Jason Tucker
