Since the release of the 2018 General Data Protection Regulation Act, confidential waste has become a common term across all industries.
Documents that may have been tossed into your general waste bin before, are monitored by strict rules and regulations.
Working from home has also become the norm over the past year. It is very important that you check your waste does not contain confidential information before putting it in your household bin!
What Are Classed as Confidential Documents?
Confidential waste covers more documents than you would first expect.
This can roughly be split into four categories: financial, company, employee, and contracts.
Employee Information
- CVs
- ID cards
- Disciplinary records
- Employee records
- Appraisals and reviews
- Absence reports
- Payslips
Company Information
- Customer or supplier information
- Pricing strategies
- Private internal documents
Financial Information
- Cheques
- Bank information
- Financial reviews
- Tax returns
- Sales receipts
- Invoices
- Statements
Contracts
- Photo ID documents
- Contact details
- Correspondence containing sensitive information
Why Should Confidential Documents Be Shredded?
Not disposing of confidential waste properly puts yourself and your customers at risk of identity theft and credit card fraud. Paper documents accounted for 40% of the 598 data security incidents reported by the ICO between just July and September in 2016 and this is still a major issue even now.
Even documents like CVs contain valuable information that is protected under GDPR laws. Destroying documents like this are as serious as any other confidential waste.
Organising your confidential waste even saves space in your office!
Keeping boxes full of documents not only gather dust but can eventually become a health and safety hazard. Having a regular shredding service fees up space and makes your office space more comfortable.
What Non-Paper Confidential Documents Should Be Shredded?
Information like passwords, signatures and banking details could put your business or customers at risk.
Simply erasing data from your computer or laptop before disposal unfortunately isn’t enough anymore. It is all too easy for this to fall into the wrong hands and the data to be recovered. For proper disposal, the hard drive itself must be disposed of.
Most confidential waste disposal companies will also over shredding of CVs, USBs and other IT equipment too.
In some industries, items like uniform can even be classed as secure waste. If your branded workwear could be used to impersonate or access sensitive information, it needs to be disposed of properly and securely.
Choosing an experienced waste management company and implementing a tailored confidential waste disposal plan will protect your company from data breaches and GDPR fines.
The Laws Behind Confidential Waste
The General Data Protection Regulation Act consists of 7 key principles:
- Lawfulness, fairness, and transparency
- Purpose limitation
- Data minimisation
- Accuracy
- Storage limitation
- Integrity and confidentiality (security)
- Accountability
Not following the strict laws behind confidential waste can mean your business incurs fines of 4% of your annual turnover.
These are our top tips for ensuring your business confines to the guidelines:
- Keep all confidential waste completely separate from your other waste streams.
- Don’t leave any confidential waste out in the open when other people could look through it.
- Make sure everything you throw away is thoroughly checked for confidential data.
- If you have an in-house shredder for your confidential waste, it should not be used for anything else.
- If you do not have the facilities in-house, you must make sure you use a licensed waste management company.
- Any confidential information on USBs/DVDs/CDs or any form of computer must also be disposed of in line with GDPR guidelines.
How to Find Confidential Documents Disposal
It is imperative that you use a fully licensed waste management company for your confidential waste.
Their collection staff must be uniformed and well trained to deal with this highly sensitive waste.
Laws on-site also require CCTV covering the movement of your confidential waste and dictate that it can only be held for 24 hours before being shredded.
Here at KCM Waste Management, we offer a bespoke confidential waste disposal service. Whether you require regular or ad hoc collections, our service is fully tailored.
We have a 0% landfill ethos for our shredding facilities which means you are safe in the knowledge that your waste is being recycled.
Our site is fully licensed by the Environment Agency to carry and dispose of all of your business waste.
For a free quote or some friendly advice, please send us a message.