So here we are. At that juncture which we have all be expecting, where warning and preparation meet reality. The GDPR has delivered intention of its first astronomical penalty value, with British Airways in its cross-hairs, to the tune of £183 million.

After last years high-profile data breach, it was expected that British Airways would be made an example of; and what an example it is.

For some, it might have felt like the GDPR was a little bit of an anti-climax. Relative hysteria in the build up to May 2018 has not led to the end of marketing departments, mass administration of fined companies or denial of service by DPIA's.

Instead, in the 12 months since its enforcement, all has been a little quiet.

Or has it?

In today's IT environments, you would be hard pushed to not find some element of cloud usage. Whether that be email, storage or virtual machine hosting and computational power, this is no more evident than the 2018 growth statistics for Microsoft's Office 365; sitting at between 2 and 3 million new accounts added each month.

If there is one topic which most channel partners are keen to address, then it is managed security services. Keen to be more than just peddlers of security software; and wanting to provide a wider service, channel partners are faced with a bountiful marketplace of small-to-medium sized businesses who desire high-grade solutions with lesser pricing and more flexibility.

There are many myths surrounding the creation and naming of Black Friday, that yearly American imported shopping bonanza, which seemingly includes almost anything these days. Including, the dark web where it was reported that cyber criminal gangs were selling stolen credit card details at a limited discount.

Despite it being punished under the Data Protection Act 1998, the penalty handed out to Equifax recently in reaction to their catastrophic handling of a widely reported data breach in 2017, has pushed the issue of data protection and the GDPR right back under the spotlight.

I am sure that we can all agree that cloud hosted software or SaaS (Software as a Service) is generally more cost effective, more convenient and easier to maintain. But in the back of our minds, there is always a concern about security; and whether or not submitting to the cloud means losing control.