GDPR – Top five tips for charities from the Information Commissioner’s Office 

Here are our top five of data protection tips for small and medium sized charities and third sector organisations:

1. Tell people what you are doing with their data

People should know what you are doing with their information and who it will be shared with. This is a legal requirement (as well as established best practice) so it is important you are open and honest with people about how their data will be used.

2. Make sure your staff are adequately trained

New employees must receive data protection training to explain how they should store and handle personal information. Refresher training should be provided at regular intervals for existing staff.

3. Use strong passwords

There is no point protecting the personal information you hold with a password if that password is easy to guess. All passwords should contain upper and lower case letters, a number and ideally a symbol. This will help to keep your information secure from would-be thieves.

4. Encrypt all portable devices

Make sure all portable devices – such as memory sticks and laptops – used to store personal information are encrypted.

5. Only keep people’s information for as long as necessary

Make sure your organisation has established retention periods in place and set up a process for deleting personal information once it is no longer required.

Source: ico.org.uk