Guaranteed privacy, while protecting the value of data

Thinking Cap Blog | 2023-07-04

Protecting the value of data while living up to the privacy your learners are guaranteed

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is a European standard but as it was the first to be so comprehensively defined and enforced it has quickly come to be a started used throughout the world. Regional standards like The Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA) in Canada or The CCPA (California Consumer Privacy Act) in the US all have similar goals.

Custom fields for users and activities

Metadata

Thinking Cap is a system that runs on data. We use metadata about Users and Activities to drive a ton of automation and reporting. It is the uniqueness of the data types each of our clients uses that make their solution bespoke to them. So, with so many types of data and the relationship to privacy unique to each type Thinking Cap can’t employ a cookie-cutter approach to safeguarding privacy.

Screenshot of custom fields

User-identifiable data

Anonymizing data

Does your organization get requests to anonymize data from users? We have a built-in function to allow you to anonymize any user with a single click.

Screenshot of anonymized data

Requests are easy to track and but what about the day-to-day ongoing management of users who have become inactive? When a user goes inactive is defined by you and could be due to inactivity or the result of a message to the LMS from your User Management System. Regardless of how it is triggered, each metadata field has its own defined “Time To Live” after which the system will delete that data. This allows each organization to reflect on the information it is keeping and to make the appropriate choice as to when to remove data.

Following these principles, a user’s data is slowly and precisely dehydrated till in the end, all we have is a unique identifier demographic data, learner records and logs without any personal data.

The timelines and fields affected will be correctly forgotten to follow the spirit and letter of the GDPR while maintaining the hard-won demographic and Learning data needed to protect the training investments made by our clients.

Promoting stronger data security practices, while helping to prevent data breaches and unauthorized access will be key to the success of your training program going forward. If you're looking to implement an LMS that enforces these requirements, book a demo of these features.

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