As the most important players in a concentrated field that continues to branch into learning and education, the “tech giants” are worth studying if you want to learn how others are preparing for the arrival of the new privacy and data protection laws in Europe.
Amazon: AWS Fully GDPR Ready
A comprehensive guide for organizations across all levels of knowledge and AWS usage is available on their website (click here to read). Amazon guarantees that its servers and their more than 500 extra services comply and fulfill pretty much every customer need.
Apple: Compliance in the Making
Apple’s only direct allusion to the new law is in its Privacy Governance Statement. They report “undertaking Privacy Impact Assessments of our major products and services,” which suggests they still have work left in ensuring compliance for their customers.
Facebook: Hit or Miss?
For many reasons, GDPR owes Facebook some credit for the heightened publicity. While relatively unscathed from the recent controversies, many expected the company’s changes to comply with European law would protect the rest of the users, but now this is unlikely. It seems Facebook is preparing to keep European data in Ireland and move everything else to the United States to avoid having to follow GDPR unnecessarily. See Facebook’s GDPR guide for business here.
Google: Extra Measures
Google’s services, from the cloud to G Suite (including G Suite for Education and Google Classroom) have been preparing for better data practices for a while, perhaps due to a history of fines both in Europe and the US. As a result, comprehensive, but often highly technical, guides are available for customers and developers using Google.
Microsoft: Try Microsoft Compiler
Perhaps the most comprehensive guide, featuring videos and webinars, a whitepaper, and the “Compliance Manager” app for a risk self-assessment, Microsoft stands out in terms of tools that help you take preemptive GDPR action.
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