Companies are still being lax with customer data after GDPR came into force, research by 247meeting has found.
A quarter of employees who have access to customer data haven’t been trained on GDPR, with almost half of employees working in marketing and PR having received no GDPR training whatsoever, the poll of 2000 respondents finds.
The research uncovers worrying findings almost four months after GDPR came into effect on 25 May 2018. More than a third of employees don’t know where their IT security policy is saved, and just 13% are confident they remember all of it. Some one in five employees have experienced some kind of security incident during their career, whether that’s a data breach or cyber attack.
The top five industries that haven’t been trained on GDPR include hospitality, marketing and PR, engineering and manufacturing, media, and property and construction. The findings showed remote workers are the least likely to have been trained on GDPR, with a quarter unsure if their company has an IT security policy at all.
Social media use a concern
Another worrying finding was office-based workers mostly use social channels to discuss work-related issues, with 27% using WhatsApp, 21% SMS, and 18% Facebook Messenger. Some 40% of millennials use WhatsApp to talk about work issues compared with only one in 10 employees aged 55 and over using the app.
The research confirmed a common security issue, with a third of senior managers using the same password for email and external websites, while 42% of those in marketing, advertising and PR admitted to discussing business issues, salaries and sensitive company information at their desk during a conference call.
Gavan Doherty, CEO at conferecing provider 247meeting said: “We were shocked that so many industries weren’t trained on GDPR especially because of the new laws that have been put in place this year. I think it is important for all companies to be reminded that customer data, as well as company data, needs to be protected by employees by doing these simple practices.”
