4 steps to make your website GDPR compliant

The European Union released new rules related to data privacy, which came into effect on May 25, 2018. You might have noticed a massive number of websites asking permission to accept their cookie policies, many Terms of Service and Privacy Policy updates flooding your inbox. All of this is because of the introduction of the GDPR. In this article, we’ll show you how to make your website GDPR compliant.

What is GDPR?

GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) essentially protects EU citizens from data breaches and privacy misconduct. The new regulation requires organizations to provide EU citizens with information and transparency about how their data is stored and collected. EU citizens also have the right to have their information removed from the database of organizations.

Why is GDPR necessary?

Wherever your business is located, any association with EU citizens makes you affected by GDPR. Hence, you must ensure that your website is GDPR ready to be able to serve EU citizens.

How to start?

Make sure that you go through the steps below to make your website GDPR ready.

1. Create a Privacy Policy

Businesses targeting EU citizens need to:

  • Create a Privacy Policy
  • Make sure that the Privacy Policy is written in a concise and clear language
  • Make sure that the Privacy Policy is easy to access on the website

After creating the policy, make sure that you copy the policy to a page on your website and link to the page from your cookie notification banner and the footer.

The GDPR requires websites that receive traffic from the EU to get the visitor’s consent to use cookies. You can customize your cookie notification and display it on your website until the site visitor accepts your policy.

3. Add user agreement fields to contact forms

GDPR requires you to obtain consent whenever you collect data from the visitors of your website. You should gain consent for everything ranging from contact information, names, email addresses, etc. To do so, all websites with EU traffic must have a field in contact forms or email list sign-ups where users can provide consent when giving information to you. You can give your site visitors the ability to provide consent through a user agreement field

4. Add Terms of Service

If you have an online store, you also need your customers’ consent to process their data. You should have Terms of Service documentation in your checkout so that users can showcase their consent when processing orders. 

Note: This article should only serve as a guide to give you a basic idea about GDPR compliance. This article should not be taken as legal advice. Consult your attorney for more details about GDPR compliance.

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