Privacy Policy vs. Privacy Notice: What’s the Difference

Key Differences Between Privacy Policy & Privacy Notice

Where Do You Need to Publish Privacy Notice, Policy, or Statement?

The footer of your website, the menus of mobile apps, and other places where you ask users to provide personal information, such as e-commerce checkout pages and email newsletter sign-up forms, are all excellent places to link to your Privacy Policy.

Your website should prominently display your privacy statement or notice. You can publish it by creating a page just for the announcement by:

• Including a pop-up link to the page,
• Including a sizable, noticeable link on the home page,
• Adding a privacy notice footer,
• Adding a link to the menus of mobile apps.

It's not necessary to make your privacy policy available to the public. However, it ought to be simple for your staff to access. Ensure that the document is accessible to every employee who interacts with client data using tools like:

• Posting the privacy policy on your staff’s internal portal,
• Adding the policy to the shared cloud drives' main folder,
• Emailing the policy to every employee.

Dynamic vs. Static Privacy Notice Strategy

A dynamic privacy notice is generally defined as a constantly up-to-date and current document. On the other hand, a static privacy notice refers to a notice that is immobile or fixed.

This demarcation is important because, traditionally, organizations have typically used a static privacy notice method. Thus, when regulators modify privacy rules, or firms alter their data gathering procedures, the notices must be updated accordingly.

To update dynamic privacy notices, privacy officers must work with various internal stakeholders, acquire information about their data processing and cookie activities, and update privacy notices to maintain compliance. Most privacy officers use manual techniques like evaluations, documents, or emails to gather data from their assets and data processing activities. It can be tiresome and time-consuming to track hundreds of these assessments (one for each corporate entity).

Additionally, the surveys and assessments become outdated when new data features are introduced. This is because many departments in large corporations gather and use personal data for various purposes and it is quite common for different teams and products to use the data for different or new reasons within the enterprise. For example, marketing teams frequently update websites with new code to monitor user interaction, product preferences, website performance indicators, etc. When a user first visits a website, these tracking codes, sometimes called "cookies," are downloaded to their computers. Marketing teams might also use the personal data gathered from one activity for new marketing activities etc. Consequently, companies must continuously check their websites for new cookies and update their privacy notices to reflect these additions.

Therefore, it’s no secret that updating static privacy policies regularly can be exceedingly difficult, time-consuming and risky for organizations in today’s dynamic and fast data driven economic environment which is strictly regulated by watchful privacy regulators.

Why Modern Organizations Need to Have a Dynamic Privacy Notice Strategy

Dynamic privacy notices utilize technology, automation and data intelligence to provide automated updates to privacy notices to reflect the changes in data processing activities and data usage in an organization. They also are responsive to regulatory changes and developments such as when privacy laws are amended or new requirements are enforced.

Dynamic privacy notices have the capability to sync with automated privacy tools such automated data mapping and monitoring capabilities, cookie scanners, dynamic DSR intake forms to pre-populate or import the most updated information of an organization’s data processing activities and other important information and update it within a privacy notice without the need for labor and time intensive manual assessment.

Given the fast paced nature of data driven innovations in today’s industry and the plethora of unique privacy laws and regulations popping up in every jurisdiction which are being strictly enforced by regulators - organizations need to shift from time intensive, error-prone and costly static privacy notice strategy to a dynamic one to avoid the risk of non-compliance.

How Does Securiti Help?

Securiti’s Privacy Policy & Notice Management integrates with Cookie Consent, Data Mapping, Universal Preference Center, and Data Subject Rights to dynamically update privacy policies or notices and comply with the region’s governing regulations.

The solution also enables organizations to:

• Publish privacy notices in minutes using pre-built templates, simplifying the entire process and ensuring consistency.
• Centralize management by tracking and monitoring privacy notices across multiple systems.
• Accelerate the periodic review process by quickly scanning the websites, detecting new cookies, and dynamically updating the privacy policy or notice.
• Native integration with Securiti’s privacy-ops platform keeps notices up-to-date.

Large enterprises increasingly need a solution to automate scanning, data discovery, and streamlining privacy rules or notices. Additionally, businesses increasingly need to gather personal data to personalize marketing campaigns and increase client loyalty. This calls for a dynamic privacy policy strategy to assure compliance while saving time and money.