You Shall Not Pass - the Rise of Compliance Gatekeepers

Ever heard of a business that automates vetting your vendors? Or those who claim to reliably summarize your policies by simply listing tools you use? Then this brief article is for you!

We provide a service. Our goal is to add value to your daily operations for a fraction of the cost of your employee or external support. Our SaaS solution delivers certain qualities and features.

We offer you tools, toggles, levers and transparency such that you can adjust your risk appetite when it comes to data collection. You are the data controller. You use our tool, equipped with all necessary disclosures from your data processor; in this case, Wide Angle Analytics can take appropriate measures.

The key here is transparency and access to up-to-date information. And that's where a new genre of data brokers emerges. These vendors support businesses in capturing and summarizing data processing activities (i.e. how your vendors handle, store and process data) and other privacy-related disclosures.

Some vendors even automate the generation of stock policies depending on your tools. Getting a fresh, ever-green Privacy Policy, Terms and Conditions, and Cookie Policy is a breath of fresh air for numerous Data Protection Officers across industries.

So, where is the problem?

We, service providers, are at the mercy of these data brokers. Modern-day Internet businesses iterate quickly. We change sub-processors and update our policies monthly or even weekly. We seek an optimal solution that offers the least friction.

These data brokers mentioned above quickly start serving obsolete, incomplete data. With an unclear update process and data governance about your business, you are at the mercy of these 3rd parties. And they could be disseminating invalid, incorrect or damaging information about your activities.

Easy, just demand getting delisted - you say

Well, that's not easy. However, it does not change that customers seeking to simplify their data processor management will be drawn toward these solutions.

If your SaaS is not listed, are you even worthy? We face this challenge on a daily basis. Unfortunately, some data brokers happily list our competitors but have no open nor transparent process of introducing Wide Angle Analytics to the listing.

To create transparency and simplify compliance, we, the industry, have created a space where gatekeepers flourish and have the potential to obfuscate the market landscape.

Closing words

A recent regulatory pressure to take care of privacy and assure proper standards in data handling was long overdue. We at Wide Angle Analytics wholeheartedly support these efforts.

But we cannot agree to the situation where the new generation of gatekeepers control who gets access to our business.