{"id":251597,"date":"2022-01-24T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-01-24T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/blog\/protecting-customer-data-during-support\/"},"modified":"2026-01-15T15:55:45","modified_gmt":"2026-01-15T20:55:45","slug":"protecting-customer-data-during-support","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/blog\/protecting-customer-data-during-support\/","title":{"rendered":"Protecting Customer Data During the Support Process"},"content":{"rendered":"
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With new data protection requirements and security threats it\u2019s important that Support organizations understand their role in protecting their organizations from these risks.\u00a0 As Support is an external interface to customers and partners, it\u2019s important to understand how to minimize risk associated with troubleshooting products in customers\u2019 environments.<\/p>\n

Guest Post By Paul Esch: Strategy and Business Development, TSANet<\/h5>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Protecting Customer Data During the Support Process<\/h1>\n

Over the past several years the importance of securing customer data has become a top priority for companies.\u00a0 With laws such as General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the government can impose fines on organizations that misuse or expose customer data.\u00a0 Attacks such as ransomware also have also highlighted the risk of doing business in todays connected business environment.<\/p>\n

With new data protection requirements and security threats it\u2019s important that Support organizations understand their role in protecting their organizations from these risks.\u00a0 As Support is an external interface to customers and partners, it\u2019s important to understand how to minimize risk associated with troubleshooting products in customers\u2019 environments.<\/p>\n

Partnering with your IT group<\/h2>\n

Protecting customer data is a corporate level responsibility that often managed by the organizations IT group.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 While the IT group may have overall responsibility for securing the data, it is the support organization that is using and updating this information and often the source of breaches.<\/p>\n

Partnering with the IT organization to define best practices and obtain certifications such as ISO 27001 is a great way to ensure the security of customer data.\u00a0 ISO\/IEC 27001 is widely known, providing requirements for an information security management system (ISMS).\u00a0\u00a0 Using this standard enables organizations of any kind to manage the security of assets such as customer data, financial information, intellectual property, employee details or information entrusted by third parties.<\/p>\n

Working with Partners \u2013 Multi Vendor Support<\/h2>\n

While obtaining ISO27001 is a great way to ensure the protection of customer data within your organization, working with Partners adds a challenge if the collaboration requires the exchange of customer information.\u00a0\u00a0 Vendors working with Partners on common customer issues should follow the best practices below:<\/p>\n

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  1. Ensure that the collaboration is supported by a legal agreement<\/li>\n
  2. Ensure that the customer is aware of the collaboration and has authorized it<\/li>\n
  3. Only share what is needed to solve the technical issue<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    For more information about Multi Vendor Support read:<\/p>\n

    Optimizing Multi-Vendor Support Collaboration<\/p>\n

    TSANet \u2013 Operational Framework to Protect Customer Data<\/h2>\n

    TSANet<\/a>\u00a0provides the operational framework and best practices for Members to collaborate on customer issues by providing the following:<\/p>\n

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    1. A\u00a0legal framework<\/a>\u00a0that supports collaboration on customer issues<\/li>\n
    2. The ISO 27001 certified\u00a0TSANet Connect<\/a>\u00a0platform for requesting collaboration between members<\/li>\n
    3. A set of best practices integrated into the\u00a0multi-vendor support processes<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      About TSANet<\/h2>\n

      TSANet is a member run community with over 800 companies committed to streamlining multi-vendor support collaboration. TSANet is a not-for-profit industry organization founded in 1993 to provide a common legal framework and technology platform to facilitate vendor collaboration.<\/p>\n

      If you do not have a multi-vendor strategy or are looking to streamline the way you cooperate with other companies, visit TSANet for more information (www.tsanet.org<\/a>).<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      With new data protection requirements and security threats it\u2019s important that Support organizations understand their role in protecting their organizations from these risks. This article introduces how to protect customer …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":37,"featured_media":251598,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","footnotes":"","_wp_rev_ctl_limit":""},"categories":[46,64,9,14],"tags":[65,66,67,68],"class_list":["post-251597","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-support","category-guest-post","category-process","category-technology","tag-channel-partners","tag-gdpr","tag-multi-vendor","tag-tsanet","post_outcome-deliver-support-effectively","post_outcome-scale-delivery-capability","post_activity-support"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251597","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/37"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=251597"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251597\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":254895,"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251597\/revisions\/254895"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/251598"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=251597"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=251597"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=251597"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}