IT and data security people, including CISOs, VPs and CTOs have signed up and committed to ‘give a day‘ to help charities in all aspects of IT, security and data privacy. Charities including Great Ormond Street Hospital, Future First and Cancer Research have already signed up to the GiveADay scheme prior to its official launch on October 9. GiveADay is a non-profit organisation: visit www.GiveADay.co.uk.
The launch event for volunteers and charities will run at IP EXPO Europe, on October 8 at ExCeL London – the cloud and IT infrastructure event, where there will be introductory sessions on best practice in information security and data protection. You can register to offer skills and experience (called contributions) to a charity. GiveADay will then match an appropriately skilled and available professional with a specific charity based on that charity’s requirements. Some of the contributions include, helping to train staff on information security awareness and providing guidance on data security. Volunteers signed up so far include Andrzej Kawalec, CTO of HP who joins the GiveADay Advisory Board that includes; Edward Tucker, Head of Cyber Security, HMRC, Sarah Clarke an experienced Risk and Governance Lead, Brian Honan, BH Consulting, Neira Jones an Independent Security Advisor, with Jason Shankaradasan and Jason Waterman of Badenoch & Clark.
Amar Singh, GiveADay founder, says: “Charities are in a particularly vulnerable position – they hold a lot of sensitive data on both their services users and their donors. They are still subject to the same fines from the ICO as any other company and are subject to far more rigorous requirements to report a breach. The requirement to report breaches to the ICO results in disproportionate fines to the ’Third’ sector plus the stigma of adverse publicity that can severely impact on operations and fundraising ability. We want to support charities to protect the vast quantities of sensitive data they hold with professional advice and training.” These sentiments are echoed by Hemang Patel, the co-founder of the GiveADay movement; an ex-Google employee with a keen interest in data privacy.
Ian Chivers, Director of Finance and Operations ,Great Ormond Street Hospital Children’s Charity – one of the charities taking part in the GiveADay initiative, adds: “Information Security has always been and continues to be a big focus for us and the GiveADay movement sounds like a great way to achieve greater focus across the sector and collectively pool our knowledge and experience. Our members – service users and supporters alike – trust us with a lot of their personal data. Protecting their private information is of utmost importance to us and we are delighted that the UK’s best talent are willing to help us with this, via the GiveADay movement.”
Martyn Croft and Brian Shorten are co-founders of the Charities Security Forum (CSF). Martyn Croft says: “The Charities Security Forum was founded back in 2007 to recognise and support the individuals who carry the responsibility for information security in the third sector. For GiveADay to facilitate easy access to freely given expertise in this way is a fantastic opportunity for all charities to further enhance the information security so essential in their work.”
Mark Green – Chief Information Security Officer at Cancer Research UK, says: “Trust is vital to charities and GiveADay will provide valuable support for them to do the right job, get the basics right and continue achieving their goals.”
And Alex Shapland-Howes, Managing Director, Future First, says: “Cyber security is just as important for charities as it is for big business. GiveADay sounds like it will be a brilliant way of making sure charities can access top level professionals to help them keep the data they hold safe.”
