Tag Archives: Compliance
Effective Data Management Strategies for Solvency II Compliance
Recent announcements by the European Parliament to delay Solvency II implementation deadlines to 2014 are in the headlines as European insurers are seen as being ill-prepared for the minimum capital requirements that will be brought in by Solvency II regulation. A big reason for this stems from the data requirements and challenges companies face to ensure proper regulatory reporting and accurate risk calculations to guarantee compliance.
Complying with Solvency II has the same level of data challenges as did Basel II in the global banking industry as insurers set out to improve how they monitor and measure risk. Many are investing in risk scoring systems, data warehouses, business intelligence, and analytic applications to support their needs. Unfortunately, years of standalone business units, legacy underwriting, policy management, claims, and pricing systems, lack of proper technology to integrate, govern, and share critical data present critical business issues may further delay companies from meeting even these new deadlines. (more…)
Why Is Reference Data A Big Issue Today?
Karen Hsu shares why reference data is a big issue today and how Informatica helps customers better manage risk and comply with new regulation.
For additional research on reference data trends, see the following report from Aite Group:
Reference Data Acquisition Challenges: Getting it Right From the Start
Protecting Healthcare Data
Richard Cramer, Chief Healthcare Strategist at Informatica talks about protecting healthcare data in non-production testing environments.
With MDM, Customer Centricity Also Helps With Customer Privacy Compliance
Organizations considering master data management (MDM) to support customer centricity often focus on how MDM can help them attract and retain customers and drive revenue through a complete customer view. They also assess the productivity gains of sparing sales and service teams from hunting for customer data in disparate applications.
It’s important to consider another effect that MDM can have on your organization—enabling compliance with current and future consumer privacy regulations. (more…)
Why Making Data “Worthless” Is Useful
The Healthcare industry is facing more challenges today than ever regarding data security as a result of increased Healthcare compliance initiatives. The most vulnerable area for data security is in non-production environments. How can Healthcare IT organizations ensure secure data, while providing non-production environments that meet testing and development needs?
I recently wrote a guest blog for SearchHealthIT. It reviews some of the technologies available to address these challenges, the most effective being Data Masking. Data Masking is a method of replacing sensitive data in test and development environments with contextually accurate benign data that meets the requirements of both test and development teams.
Check out Why Making Data “Worthless” Is Useful: Best practices for ensuring the privacy and security of health care data and let me know your thoughts.
Putting Master Data In The Hands Of Business Users
As companies increasingly explore master data management (MDM), we often hear inquiries about the usability of master data by business users.
Common questions include: Do business users need to learn and use a separate MDM application? Do they need support from IT to access master data? Can master data fit into the everyday business applications they use for CRM, SFA, ERP, supply chain management, and so forth?
If your organization has ever asked these questions, you should take a look at our new white paper, “Drive Business User Adoption of Master Data.” (more…)
Realizing The Cost Savings of Mergers & Acquisitions by Retiring Legacy Applications
Following a Merger and Acquisition (M&A), there is usually a focus on consolidating the two companies’ IT systems, leaving behind many redundant legacy applications. Until those legacy applications are shut down, you haven’t realized the cost savings of the consolidation. However, those old applications may contain data that’s no longer used for daily operations, but need to be retained for regulatory compliance. Keeping those applications up and running, just to retain the data within them introduces operational, business and legal risks. It is likely that the IT staff who have the expertise about those applications are no longer with the company, and without them it may be difficult to impossible to access the data in a meaningful way, in the time required, for an audit or eDiscovery request.
Inaugural Gartner MDM Summit In London A Major Hit
Europe might have started a little later than the U.S. with master data management, but if the inaugural Gartner MDM Summit for EMEA is any indication, it’s catching up quickly. Well over 350 registrants attended the event in London in early February, with strong representation from the UK, France, the Netherlands and other EMEA countries. Gartner Research VP Andrew White called the event a “major hit,” and I have to agree. (more…)
How Is Database Archiving Different From Backup?
The utilization of backup vs. archiving software for databases is often confused in many organizations. Customers often use backup for the purposes of archiving and vice versa. A survey conducted by Symantec Software recently indicates that 70% of enterprises are misusing backup, recovery, and archiving practices. The survey shows that 70% of the enterprises use their backup software to implement legal holds and 25% preserve the entire backup set indefinitely. Also, the survey respondents said 45% of their backup storage is due to legal holds. Additionally, nearly half of the enterprises surveyed are improperly using their backup and recovery software for archiving.
So what are the differences between the two types of solutions? What should each be used for and how are they complementary?
MDM – What’s The Cost Of Bad Data In Financial Services?
One of the most critical first steps for financial services firms looking to implement multidomain master data management (MDM) is to quantify the cost savings they could achieve.
Unfortunately, a thorough analysis of potential ROI is also one of the steps least followed (a key culprit being disconnects between business and IT).
This shortcoming is spotlighted in a new Informatica white paper, “Five Steps to Managing Reference Data More Effectively in Investment Banking,” which outlines key questions to ask in sizing up the cost implications of bad data and antiquated systems, such as:
- How long does it take to introduce a new security to trade?
- How many settlements need to be fixed manually?
- How many redundant data feeds does your firm have to manage?
- How accurate and complete are your end-of-day reports?
- Do you have the data you need to minimize risk and exposure? (more…)