Regulatory requirements at the state and federal levels are putting growing pressure on companies to safeguard the privacy of data pertaining to customers, employees and suppliers. At the same time, mobile devices and social media provide ample new opportunities for private data to seep out.

To deal with the growing challenges to data privacy, GE launched an Information Governance Council to bring together the company's IT and legal experts, reports Bill Brenner at CSOOnline. The legal experts focus on the policies necessary to keep information out of the wrong hands, while the IT security experts figure out the right privacy controls to address those concerns.

The information governance structure encompasses the policies, procedures and rules covering how data is created, used and disposed. Each business function at GE is audited to determine the applicable regulatory requirements, according to Nuala O'Connor Kelly, GE's senior counsel and chief privacy leader. 

For more:
- see Bill Brenner's article at CSOOnline

Related Articles:
Legal minefields in the course of an IT worker's day
Data breach laws, e-discovery increase compliance duties
Hotspots multiply while legal questions over data privacy persist
This email will self destruct