Regulatory Compliance
The data you store is increasingly governed by regulatory compliance which will affect how you store managed and archive this information.
Regulatory compliance however is not an off the shelf purchased to become compliant, rather a set of policies and procedure that meet the aims of the business to comply and includes methods to ensure that personnel are aware of and take steps to comply with relevant laws and regulations
Compliance in the UK
There is considerable regulation in the UK, some of which is from EU legislation. Various areas are policed by different bodies, such as the FSA (Financial Services Authority), EPA (Environment Protection Agency), Information Commissioner and others.
Important compliance issues for all organisations large and small include the Data Protection Act (http://www.ico.gov.uk/for_organisations.aspx ) and Freedom of Information Act 2000 (http://www.opsi.gov.uk/Acts/acts2000/ukpga_20000036_en_1 ) .
Combined Code (http://www.frc.org.uk/corporate/combinedcode.cfm ) issued by the London Stock Exchange (LSE) is the Sarbanes-Oxley equivalent in the UK.
Compliance in the USA
In general, compliance means conforming to a specification or policy, standard or law that has been clearly defined. Corporate scandals and breakdowns such as the Enron case in 2001 have highlighted the need for stronger compliance regulations for publicly listed companies. The most significant regulation in this context is the Sarbanes-Oxley Act developed by two U.S. congressmen,
Senator Paul Sarbanes and Representative Michael Oxley in 2002 which defined significant tighter personal responsibility of corporate top management for the accuracy of reported financial statements.
Compliance in the USA generally means compliance with laws and regulations. These laws can have criminal or civil penalties or can be regulations. The definition of what constitutes an effective compliance plan has been elusive. Most authors, however, continue to cite the guidance provided by the United States Sentencing Commission in Chapter 8 of the Federal Sentencing Guidelines.
On October 12 2006, the U.S. Small Business Administration re-launched Business.gov which provides a single point of access to government services and information that help businesses comply with government regulations.
There are a number of other regulations such as GLBA, FISMA, and HIPAA. In some cases other compliance frameworks (such as COBIT) or standards (NIST) inform on how to comply with the regulations
If you have parent companies based in the US or trade with US based companies you may be required to meet these regulations even though your business is in the UK
Alpha will work with your Compliance Officer and your System Architects to ensure that you have a data management system in place that can meet your organisations compliance objectives.