The 2 standards you should meet to ensure your security – and prove it

Every company is different, and therefore has different needs when it comes to compliance. What do you need to comply with and what’s the best way to do it? That mostly depends on what industry you’re in, what kind of product or service you offer and even to some degree the character of your business.

Having said that, there are two established standards that almost every business should know something about. Ideally, you shouldn’t only be aware of them, you should be certified in both to form a foundation of trust for the work you do. We’re talking of course about ISO 27001 and PCI DSS.

ISO 27001

Ever wondered how customers, clients and government bodies could judge how well you protect the information that’s been entrusted to your business? Especially in this day in age, confidence that you can do so is crucial: your employees need to know that their personal information is kept safe, if you store any kind of private data from your customers, they need to feel confident that it won’t be stolen or given away, and in some cases, government needs to have some way of gauging whether or not you’re following recognized best practices.

ISO 27001 is the neon sign indicating to all these parties that you can be trusted to keep data safe by following industry standards accepted across the board as the fundamentals to information security. On a more practical level, compliance with ISO 27001 means consciously maintaining a data protection system informed by comprehensive risk assessment and reviewing management structure and behavior to facilitate security.

PCI DSS

It’s a mouthful, but PCI DSS (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard) is critical to any operation that stores, processes or transmits credit card information. Originally designed to reduce credit card fraud, PCI DSS has grown in importance to become an indicator of how safe it is for your company to perform credit card transactions. In some jurisdictions, compliance with PCI DSS is even required by law.

Similar to ISO 27001, PCI DSS stresses the need for data protection in particular, since customers making credit card payments must trust you with their credit card information in the process. Firewalls, strong encryption and other practical steps are all detailed in the clauses of PCI DSS.

Complying with these kinds of standards might seem like a lot of extra effort at first glance, but in reality you’re doing yourself a favor as much as you’re doing one for your customers. Demonstrating the security of your company by meeting these two standards in particular can protect you from lawsuits and government intervention, but it can also prevent costly attacks on your business and make sure your growth can go unhindered by all kinds of negative external influences. ISO 27001 and PCI DSS protect you as much as they protect everyone else.