India 6th in GDPR readiness index: Cisco

Nearly 65 per cent of Indian organisations are better prepared for the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), making the country the sixth leading nation globally in the GDPR readiness index, global networking leader Cisco said on Friday.

The GDPR, which focused on increasing protection for EU residents' privacy and personal data, came into force in May last year and organisations globally have been working steadily towards getting ready for it.

"India has greatly improved upon its GDPR readiness with its fast-evolving data privacy ecosystem, which is primarily because of a collaborative approach by the government and private organisations," said Vishak Raman, Director, Security, Cisco.

"However, there remains a huge scope for Indian organizations to increase their investments in people, and technology controls to meet customer privacy requirements faster," Raman added.

More than 3,200 global security and privacy professionals in 18 countries across major industries responded to the Cisco survey about their organisations' privacy practices.

"Only 37 per cent of GDPR-ready companies experienced a data breach costing more than $500,000, compared with 64 per cent of the least GDPR-ready companies," said the report.

"Data is the new currency and as the market shifts, we see organisations realising real business benefits from their investments in protecting their data," said Michelle Dennedy, Chief Privacy Officer, Cisco.

Customers are increasingly concerned that the products and services they deploy provide appropriate privacy protections.

"Nearly 75 per cent of respondents cited that they are realising multiple broader benefits from their privacy investments, which include greater agility and innovation resulting from having appropriate data controls, gaining competitive advantage and improved operational efficiency from having data organized and catalogued," the report explained.

--IANS

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