Multinational marketers are closing in on the May 25 date by which they must comply with the EU's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). As the date looms, marketers are tying up loose ends to ensure they meet the deadline. However, most view the GDPR — a regulation that governs the way in which consumer data is collected as well as how it's used and stored — as a major challenge and remain uncertain how much their data policies will change. Scrambling to meet the deadline, companies are in various states of preparedness.
The GDPR will offer consumers in the EU more control over their personal data and outlines requirements for data collection, storage, and use. It will also impose potentially steep fines on companies with poor data-handling practices and those that experience data breaches in which they are found at fault. While the regulations are limited to the personal data of consumers living in the EU, they apply to any company handling, transmitting, or storing that data, whether it has a physical location in the EU or not. This includes marketing technology (martech) companies that process data for and receive personal data from their customers.
