As of 25th May 2018 the General Data Protection Regulation comes into force.  At HostBill we have always been committed to data privacy and security and we have taken all necessary steps to ensure GDPR compliance.

What is GDPR?

GDPR is the European Union regulation that replaces the Data Protection Directive and is aimed at strengthening and unifying data protection for all individuals within the European Union. The regulation will bring a huge change to European data security, but it will impact many non-EU based business as well.

Who needs to comply?

Any company selling to or storing personal data or behavioural information of citizens in Europe (such as name, email address, location, photo, bank details, updates on social networking websites, medical information or a computer IP address etc) will have to comply.

Moreover, any company with a web presence in EU or targeting European customers (that means for example having a website available in any language of the EU, a domain with EU country code or accepting payment in EU currency) will need to meet GDPR requirements as well.

What does GDPR change?

GDPR gives individuals the control over how their personal information is being collected, stored and used. Under GDPR individuals have the following rights:

The right to be informed – individuals will have the right to be given information about how their data is being processed and why. Individuals will also need to give consent to data processing.

The right to access – individuals will have the right to to obtain the confirmation as to whether or not personal data concerning them is being processed, where and for what purpose and to receive a copy of the personal data, free of charge, in an electronic format.

The right to be forgotten – individuals will have the right to have their personal data erased and to cease further dissemination of the data, and potentially have third parties halt processing of the data.

The right to object – individuals will have to right to object at any time to processing of personal data concerning them.

The right to data portability – individuals will have the right to receive the personal data concerning them, which they have previously provided in a ‘commonly used and machine readable format‘ and have the right to transmit that data to another controller.

Breach notification – data processors will be required to notify their customers about data breach within 72 hours of first having become aware of the breach.

How it will be executed?

The GDPR imposes high fines on data controllers and processors for non-compliance.

The fines can go up to 20 million Euros or 4 percent of annual global turnover, whichever of both is highest, however the exact fines depend on numerous factors such as how severe non-compliance and potential personal data breaches are and the measures that have been taken to be GDPR compliant.

HostBill and GDPR compliance

We’re working with our legal advisors to implement all necessary changes to ensure that HostBill will comply with the GDPR when it becomes enforceable on 25th May, 2018.  We’ll inform all of our customers about all privacy policy and security changes introduced to HostBill in regards with the GDPR by the end of April.

We would also like to encourage all of our customers to review the requirements of GDPR and make sure your data privacy policy and security practices meet those requirements.

For additional information on the GDPR please visit official GDPR website.