How to Demonstrate Compliance With GDPR Article 34

Technical Commentary

GDPR Article 34 makes it clear that not all breaches must be communicated to data subjects. However, organisations should communicate the details of a breach when it is likely to result in a high risk to the rights and freedoms of natural persons.

Article 34 outlines three main areas to focus on, when communicating a data breach:

• The language used.
• The specific details that are communicated.
• How the communication is carried out.

Controllers aren’t obligated to communicate a breach under the following three scenarios:

1. The organisation has ‘appropriate technical and organisational protection measures’ in place.
2. It takes ‘subsequent measures’ to mitigate the breach.
3. Communicating the breach would demand a disproportionate effort.

ISO 27701 Clause 6.13.1.1 (Responsibilities and Procedures) and GDPR Article 34

In this section we talk about GDPR Articles 34 (1), 34 (2), 34 (3)(a), 34 (3)(b), 34 (3)(c) and 34(4)

In order to create a cohesive, highly functioning incident management policy that safeguards the availability and integrity of privacy information during critical incidents, organisations should:

1. Adhere to a method for reporting privacy information security events.
2. Establish a series of processes that manage privacy information security-related incidents across the business, including:
• Administration.
• Documentation.
• Detection.
• Triage.
• Prioritisation.
• Analysis.
• Communication.
3. Draft an incident response procedure that enables the organisation to assess, respond to and learn from incidents.
4. Ensure that incidents are managed by trained and competent personnel who benefit from ongoing workplace training and certification programmes.

Staff involved in privacy information security incidents should understand:

1. The time it should take to resolve an incident.
2. Any potential consequences.
3. The severity of the incident.

When dealing with privacy information security events, staff should:

1. Assess events in accordance with a strict criteria that validates them as an approved incidents.
2. Categorise privacy information security events into 5 sub-topics:
• Monitoring (see ISO 27002 Controls 8.15 and 8.16).
• Detection (see ISO 27002 Control 8.16).
• Classification (see ISO 27002 Control 5.25).
• Analysis.
• Reporting (see ISO 27002 Control 6.8).
3. When resolving privacy information security incidents, organisations should:
• Response and escalate issues (see ISO 27002 Control 5.26) in accordance with the type of incident.
• Activate crisis management and business continuity plans.
• Affect a managed recovery from an incident that mitigates operational and/or financial damage.
• Ensure thorough communication of incident-related events to all relevant personnel.
4. Engage in collaborative working (see ISO 27002 Controls 5.5 and 5.6).
5. Log all incident managed-based activities.
6. Be responsible for the handling of incident-related evidence (see ISO 27002 Control 5.28).
7. Undertake a thorough root cause analysis, to minimise the risk of the incident happening again, including suggested amendments to any processes.

Reporting activities should be centred around 4 key areas:

1. Actions that need to be taken once an information security event occurs.
2. Incident forms that record information throughout an incident.
3. End-to-end feedback processes to all relevant personnel.
4. Incident reports that detail what’s occurred once an incident has been resolved.

Supporting ISO 27002 Controls

• ISO 27002 5.25
• ISO 27002 5.26
• ISO 27002 5.5
• ISO 27002 5.6
• ISO 27002 6.8
• ISO 27002 8.15
• ISO 27002 8.16

ISO 27701 Clause 6.13.1.5 (Response to Information Security Incidents) and GDPR Article 34

In this section we talk about GDPR Articles 34 (2) and 34 (1)

Organisations should ensure that privacy information security incidents are dealt with by a dedicated technical team with the skills and resources to affect a prompt resolution (see ISO 27002 Control 5.24).

Organisations should:

1. Contain any privacy-related threats arising from the original issue.
2. Collect a body of evidence throughout the resolution process.
3. Include escalation, BUDR activities and continuity planning in any resolution efforts (see ISO 27002 Controls 5.29 and 5.30).
4. Log all incident-related activity.
5. Ensure that staff operate on a “need to know” basis when dealing with privacy information incidents.
6. Be continually mindful of an their responsibilities to their customers and external organisations, when communicating privacy information incidents and data breaches.
7. Close incidents to a rigid set of resolution criteria.
8. Undertake forensic analysis (see ISO 27002 Control 5.28), as and when required.
9. Seek to establish the underlying cause of an incident, once it’s been resolved (see ISO 27002 Control 5.27).
10. Take remedial action on any associated processes, controls, policies and procedures, to bolster organisational privacy protection once an incident has been resolved.

Supporting ISO 27002 Controls

• ISO 27002 5.24
• ISO 27002 5.27
• ISO 27002 5.28
• ISO 27002 5.29
• ISO 27002 5.30

Supporting ISO 27701 Clauses and ISO 27002 Controls

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