Is your business a contender when it comes to dealing with confidential waste? Take our quick quiz to find out…

Q1: It’s time for a major clear-out of your office. Do you…?

1. Get the recycling bags out. There’s no time to check whether any of the waste you’re throwing out could identify anyone personally.
2. Ask a member of staff to shred confidential waste paper and get them to take old USBs and image cards to the local waste transfer station.
3. Look for a confidential waste company on Google, check out the cheapest, and get them to handle and destroy your waste. Get certificates of destruction. Send them your old media including USBs and hard drives too.
4. Call your ISO-accredited confidential waste service, order in lockable consoles and confidential waste recycling bags, and ensure your waste is separated into confidential and sensitive, with sensitive waste being locked away until collection day.

Q2: You’re upgrading your office computers. What do you do with the old ones?

A: Delete the files on them and take them to your waste transfer station or donate them to charity.

B: Use online programs to shred sensitive files, because deleting them means you’ve just deleted the directory to find them. They are still on there somewhere and someone with the knowledge could find them. Then, get the hardware recycled or donated to charity.

C: Send the hard drives to a confidential waste shredding company for secure shredding, then recycle the old hardware or donate the computers to charity. Get a certificate of destruction for your audit trail.

D: Your confidential waste company is ISO-accredited, so you know they handle that waste to the best standards in the industry. They shred your hard drives, give you a secure audit trail to comply with GDPR, and you can donate or recycle your hardware with peace of mind.

Q3: There’s an investigation into a data breach, and your documents are involved in the probe. Do you…?

A: Panic – you’re not sure whether they were destroyed securely and worry they may be the source of the breach.

B: Ask your staff if they complied with the rules you set, and keep your fingers crossed that they did.

C: Know your documents were sent for secure shredding. That means you’re OK, doesn’t it? You just need to find out if you had a certificate to prove that…

D: Reply quickly to the investigators that your documents were destroyed securely, that they were handled by a company with the highest standards which is ISO compliant, and that you have an audit trail of certificates to prove it. Peace of mind!

MOSTLY As: You’re the England of confidential waste protection. There’s plenty of talent, on paper you should be OK, but something often seems to go wrong. It’s time to go back to basics to ensure your confidential waste is handled and shipped securely, shredded and recycled in a way to protect your clients and employees, and you don’t fall foul of GDPR.

MOSTLY Bs: You’re like Portugal. You have one star player and a solid defensive block! But things could go horribly wrong if all the team aren’t aware of the threats from unusual places to lose data such as image cards for cameras. Plus, if your confidential waste handling systems are all in your head, and not in a plan for all your staff, how can they make them happen?

MOSTLY Cs: You’re Denmark. You started out with some problems but are improving fast and understand what you must do to comply with GDPR and keep your client and staff data safe. You may not be 100% there yet, but you’re well on your way. Take time to review your plans and systems for your confidential waste on a six-monthly basis.

MOSTLY Ds: You’re Germany. Efficient, clinical, you know what it takes to make the grade. There will be no lost data on your watch and you’re always planning to cope with the next threat. You’ll review your confidential waste arrangements several times a year, have a solid audit trail of documents proving your waste was handled correctly, and a process in place to ensure you know where your documents are at all times. We take our hats off to you!

Want to be the Germany of dealing with your confidential waste? We can help! We’re an affordable and secure shredding service in South Wales. If you need advice on dealing with the secure destruction of confidential waste, call our friendly and efficient team on 02920 676 714, or email [email protected]

Why you should choose Taclus Confidential – A South Wales secure shredding company

We offer confidential paper waste and hard drive destruction services at affordable prices.

Taclus Confidential holds the accreditations for ISO 9001:2015 for quality management and ISO14001:2015 for environmental management and has been certified by independent auditors IQS for both.

Taclus has also been selected as the confidential waste management partner for Keep Wales Tidy.