RapidFire Tools Inc. has shipped a new solution designed to help channel pros automate compliance with the European Union’s forthcoming General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).
Called Audit Guru for GDPR and based on technology from the Atlanta-based vendor’s Network Detective assessment, documentation, and reporting solution, the new system arms MSPs and internal IT departments to both confirm that end user environments meet GDPR requirements and identify potential areas of non-compliance.
The system is delivered as a virtual software appliance and includes a cloud-based management portal that resellers can use to manage the entire GDPR audit and reporting process.
“This is not just another check-list product with a laundry list of tasks that the MSP has to perform,” explained Vice President of Development Win Pham, who led the creation of Audit Guru for GDPR, in prepared remarks. “We’ve created a turn-key virtual software appliance that automates the production of mandatory compliance reports, provides ongoing issues detection, and manages the manual collection of supplemental information required from key stakeholders.”
Set to go into effect in May, GDPR replaces a series of separate data privacy rules with a consolidated and significantly more stringent set of controls. Significantly, the law applies to any organization that buys from, sells to, or partners with EU businesses, whether they’re located in Europe or not, making it relevant to a wide range of American SMBs. Companies that fail to comply with GDPR requirements can be fined up to four percent of annual revenue.
“There is a huge amount of confusion, fear and uncertainty associated with GDPR because of the fines and crippling sanctions associated with non-compliance,” said RapidFire Tools CEO Mike Mittel in a press statement. “Audit Guru addresses these concerns by providing MSPs with a solution that literally guides them through the compliance process, automates the collection of necessary data, and generates the required documents.”
Audit Guru for GDPR is available exclusively through authorized RapidFire Tools partners, who can earn revenue on the product by reselling it to end users with in-house IT personnel or by building GDPR compliance-as-a-service practices around it.
“As if the EU isn’t a big enough market, even if the MSPs or their clients are based outside of the EU, if they own electronic database files that contain personal information about customers, prospects and other individuals who are based inside the EU, they are subject to the regulation,” explained Mark Winter, RapidFire Tools’ vice president of sales, in press remarks. “This makes the market for Audit Guru even broader for MSPs, MSSPs, and VARs who wish to expand their offerings to include GDPR compliance services.”
Forrester has predicted that 80 percent of companies subject to GDPR will not be in compliance with the law when it goes into effect.
