Understanding DORA Compliance

The Digital Operational Resilience Act (DORA) is an EU regulation aimed at ensuring financial entities can withstand, respond to, and recover from ICT-related disruptions and threats such as ransomware attacks, data breaches and third-party service outages. With the compliance deadline of 17 January 2025 now passed, financial entities providing services in the EU are required to have robust measures in place to manage ICT risks effectively. This includes implementing proactive risk management, ensuring the integrity and availability of critical systems, and maintaining business continuity during operational stress. Compliance is not just a regulatory obligation; it is essential for protecting client trust, minimising reputational damage and maintaining competitive resilience in an increasingly volatile digital landscape.

‍

The Importance of Compliance

Failure to comply with DORA carries serious consequences, including fines, reputational harm, and diminished client confidence. More than just system security, DORA places strong emphasis on how organisations manage and protect their data.

You need to ensure the availability, authenticity, integrity, and confidentiality of records, using:  

1. Effective data governance. ​This means that you need to integrate your data management practices with your overall risk management approach, including understanding your legal retention policies and applying them across all systems.  

2. Data quality controls. You need the ability to validate, audit, and assure your data holdings, cleaning up obsolete and incorrect records, and ensuring the integrity of the information you hold.  

3. Data security controls. You need to protect your data from unauthorised access, which means knowing where your ‘dark data’ is lurking so that it can be properly hardened (not just PII, but also other business information that would compromise you if it was spilled). You also need to detect any access issues and other flags of breach.  

4. Data privacy controls. DORA and GDPR have overlapping requirements, and it's essential to ensure that all personal information is securely protected, easily discoverable, and not retained longer than necessary.

5. Records lifecycle management. Most importantly, records must be classified and disposed of as they reach the end of their retention period. Over-retaining personal or sensitive information increases the severity of any potential breach and raises the likelihood of compromise. Outdated, unprotected records can expose vulnerabilities in both systems and staff. Content hoarding also hampers incident response, slowing discovery and reducing data quality due to duplication and obsolete information.

How Castlepoint Systems Supports DORA Compliance

Castlepoint's platform is designed to address these critical areas:​

• Complete Visibility: Our Explainable AI offers comprehensive visibility into every record across all systems, reading every word of every item. This ensures that your data estate is fully mapped and understood, facilitating effective risk management.​

• Automated Risk and Compliance Monitoring: Castlepoint automatically assesses and flags non-compliance, risk, and retention issues, reducing the need for manual checks and ensuring continuous compliance.​

• Incident Response Readiness: With a full audit trail and real-time alerts, you'll be prepared to report ICT-related incidents quickly and accurately, meeting DORA's stringent reporting requirements.​

• Third-Party Oversight: Our platform tracks and governs data across all platforms and providers, including cloud services, ensuring compliance beyond your internal systems.

• Testing and Resilience: Castlepoint enables simulation of threats and identification of vulnerabilities in data handling and protection, supporting proactive resilience testing as mandated by DORA.​

Next Steps for Organisations

Given that the DORA compliance deadline has passed, it's crucial to act promptly:​

1. Conduct a Gap Analysis: Assess your current state against DORA requirements to identify areas needing improvement.​

2. Implement Controls and Tools: Utilise solutions like Castlepoint to mitigate identified risks effectively.​

3. Document Policies and Incident Response Plans: Ensure all policies are up-to-date and that incident response plans are well-documented and tested.​

4. Ensure Visibility Across Systems: Achieve comprehensive visibility not just within your organisation but also across third-party providers.​

5. Automate Monitoring and Reporting: Implement automated systems to maintain compliance at scale and reduce the burden on your teams.​

What’s Next?

Castlepoint Systems is committed to supporting your organisation in navigating the complexities of DORA compliance. Our platform's capabilities align seamlessly with regulatory requirements, ensuring your data is actionable, secure, and compliant.​

For more information on how Castlepoint can assist with your compliance needs, contact our team today.