Your no BS guide to GDPR

Unless you’ve been living in a cave with no internet connection - which raises bigger questions... You have most probably heard the GDPR acronym thrown around a bit lately.

Perhaps this is the first time you’ve heard of that acronym per se but we’re certain that you would have noticed that loads of companies with whom you currently have a digital handshake of sorts - Uber, Deliveroo, Amazon, Ebay, Netflix and so on have been asking you to agree to the new terms of their privacy policy…

Yawn...

I know, but is important, particularly if you collect personal data and being in the event space it is highly likely that this is the case. So lets be smart on this one and get to know your rights and obligations people!

GDPR stands for ‘General Data Protection Regulation’ and it is basically a data privacy law that has been set out by the European Union to protect the personal data of European Citizens whilst at the same time increasing the obligation of organisations that collect or process their data…

Did we mention that it was enforceable from 25th May 2018, ya-huh, that your attention didn't it?!

Even if you’re located in Australia or New Zealand don’t even start thinking that this doesn’t affect you.

The bottom line is that if you are dealing with the data of an EU citizen then this law affects you 100%. Now, you probably don’t have time to deepdive into your data pool and work out if you have any EU citizens on your books or assume that you won't get any in the future, so let's just assume you do and work together to ensure we’re all compliant on this one!

Here are three things that we have done at Register Now to be ready and compliant:

1. We have updated our Register Now services agreement - and unless you like reading legalese and want a copy… It basically stipulates our clients’ obligation to keep event participants personal information safe, secure, accessible at all times and ensures that the parties are acting in a manner that is compliant with the event participants additional rights to the extent that they are covered under GDPR.

2. We have also updated our privacy policy, you can see this on our website. We have spent time clarifying our terms and what we expect of our clients as the collector of personal data.

3. We will continue to be completely transparent with our clients and event participants when it comes to how we access, distribute, manage and store personal data, as well as how we report any security breaches or issues going forward.

This may be what we have done and we are certainly here to help our clients, but at the end of the day your primary obligation is to your customers and we urge you to be sensitive about the following three points in your effort to put your best foot forward in this new era of data:

1. Take care in the way that you treat your reports and access your account in our system
2. Consider who actually has access to your account - request and review your account user list, it might surprise you
3. Are you passing on or sharing data with a sponsor or event partner, is the process legit? Not sure? Look into it, make it squeaky clean!

Please note, this advice is not legal advice – if you have any questions, please feel free to contact us but you should of course consult your own legal counsel for bigger concerns.

If you're interested in learning more about what it means for you we suggest the following resources:

For our Australian clients vistit this site.

For our New Zealand clients visit this site.

What changes, if any, have you made to the way that you go about your business in light of this global movement to take better care of our data? This a place of shared learning and knowledge, and we would love to see your answers in the comments below!