Summary

As the Covid-19 Pandemic forces more employees than ever before to work from home (“WFH”), businesses face new and different data privacy and security risks. This change is not lost on U.S. regulators, but it does not mean that businesses will get a pass on data privacy and security issues potentially caused by the shift in working conditions. In an effort to help businesses navigate these new circumstances, BCLP has prepared a series of articles on addressing data privacy and security issues in a WFH environment.

While BCLP’s WFH series provides many helpful tips on securing your sensitive data while navigating new WFH issues, our tips are not a substitute for your company’s policies and procedures on working from home. As the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) stated in its initial guidance on employees working from home: “Follow your employer’s security practices. Your home is now an extension of your office. So, follow the protocols that your employer has implemented.”^[1]

• Share Company Policies. If employees don’t know the company’s policies, the employees cannot follow them..
  • If you are in charge of managing WFH data privacy and security issues, it is a good idea to push policies to employees on a periodic basis and after any major changes to the policies. Placing links to the policies in your email signature is also a good way to help employees find the guidance they need when they need it.
  • Prepare a one stop shop for employees to access company policies. If your company does not already have a centralized location for its policies, like an intranet site, setting one up now is a good way to make sure employees are able to easily find everything they need for WFH.
• Implement the Policies. Companies should make it easy for employees to follow the WFH policies.
  • Provide links to any software applications an employee may need to follow company policies. Employees told to access certain applications may not be able to find the app if a link is not provided. More troubling, if the app is a popular WFH solution, employees may stumble on to imposter apps hiding malware or other nasty software if the employees are left to fend for themselves in locating the app. In either case, these are issues that can be overcome by including a URL to the appropriate app source or by pushing the app to employees’ systems remotely (if possible).
  • Provide links to troubleshooting materials so that employees can try to address any problems they may encounter on their own, before contacting company personnel. Many employees are quite capable of addressing minor technical issues themselves, if provided with the right tools.
• Assist Employees. Even with extensive tutorials and lengthy Q&As, some employees will still find that they need help implementing certain practices. To that end, companies need to prepare for surges in technical questions that follow the roll out of any new WFH policies or procedures. This means adding resources at peak times to ensure that employee questions are answered in a timely manner so that bottlenecks are avoided.

This article is part of a multi-part series published by BCLP to help companies understand and cope with data security and privacy issues impacted by the Covid-19 Pandemic.  You can find more information on specific data privacy and security issues in BCLP’s California Consumer Privacy Act Practical Guide, and more information about the GDPR in the American Bar Association’s The EU GDPR: Answers to the Most Frequently Asked Questions.

[1] https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/blog/2020/03/online-security-tips-working-home