Following the recent passed Data Protection Act, Botswana Telecommunications Corporation Limited (BTCL) held a webinar last Wednesday to discuss data protection.
The webinar which was held under the theme, “The Importance of Data Protection in the Digital World,” was about storing data on the Cloud as well as about the data protection act itself.
The Ministry of Transport and Communications Deputy Permanent Secretary, Cecil Masiga said data protection is the legislative framework for ensuring the privacy of individuals in relation to how their personal data is maintained transmitted and stored. Massage said Data controllers and processors are answerable to the Commissioner wit regards to how they deal with personal data and are liable for non-compliance with the Act.
“Data protection laws regulate the protection of personal data by governmental and non-governmental organisations and that every entity that handles customers’ personal information must familiarise themselves with this piece of legislation as compliance is mandatory. Data controllers and processors are required to implement organizational and technical security safeguards to ensure confidentiality and integrity of personal data. Liability arises from failure to implement security safeguards,” said Masiga
BTC Chief Operations Officer, Aldrin Sivako said that Covid-19 has escalated the rise in the usage of the internet, as more social and economic activities take place online and as a result the importance of privacy and data protection is increasingly recognized. He said equal concern is the collection, use and sharing of personal information to third parties without notice or consent of consumers.
“Countries and enterprises are in the race to pursue digital transformation initiatives in order to remain relevant and resilient into the future while respecting the laws of the countries where they operate especially laws relating to protection of personal data. Investors will have confidence that their businesses and customer data is safe and secure from exploitation for gain or abuse by third parties through unauthorised access. BTC has invested in cloud solutions to facilitate its customers who have sensitive data that needs to be kept within the country,” said Sivako
Sivako further said BTC cloud infrastructure is flexible from storage and processing capacity, and it is currently used by several clients both in the private and public sector. He said BTC Sentlhaga Data Centre has secure cloud services environment where sensitive data is kept and protected.