June is here and it will soon be the longest day of the year – let’s hope there is some sunshine to go with that! This month we are focusing on the multiple benefits of better managing your data and details of a rather alarming deepfake incident.
Improving your data management
Data is the lifeblood of modern businesses, fuelling insights, driving decision making and shaping your company’s success. However, you need to be both confident in your data integrity and able to efficiently manage what can often be substantial volumes of information. So what can you do?
- Conduct a data inventory – knowing what data you collect, store and use is paramount but you also need to understand each data set’s purpose and how it is used
- Invest in data management tools – effective technology can provide you with cost-effective solutions to make the most of your data
- Develop data policies – making sure you are properly documenting how you manage and use data is vital
- Foster a data-driven culture – if your organisation can trust the quality of its data and how it’s used, you can move towards a data-driven culture
- Embrace continuous improvement – like many things in life, data management is an ongoing process that will evolve over time so make sure you conduct regular reviews of your practices.
Deepfake
In recent years there have been increasing reports of scammers sending fake text messages and emails to attempt to trick individuals into thinking that their nearest and dearest need help. Rather alarmingly, the techniques have evolved and a corporate company’s finance employee was tricked into making a multi-million dollar payment by a multi-person video conference where everyone else was fake. This article by CFO news provides more details. This case highlights the importance of having rigorous processes in place to counter such attempts, such as a layered confirmation process internally whenever payments are requested to verify that the request is legitimate.