Are you clear on the Data Protection Act, what rights your customers have and how you must adhere to these when dealing with customer information? With the proliferation of
customer touch points (e.g. the Web; call centres; sales representatives) and the integration of operations across geographic borders, this is of particular concern to Knexus
Digital Business member companies.<P>

And yet, as some of our members have discovered, trying to understand the current legislation is very challenging due to its ambiguous nature and the lack of precedent to
provide direction and clarity. In particular, there is a need to understand how the EU Directive on Data Protection has been translated by the UK in the form of the UK Data
Protection Act 1998.<P>

Full compliance with the Act is likely to require companies to make a considerable investment in changes to systems and processes. Alternatively, companies face either scaling down business activity, in particular around websites, CRM & KM activities, or continuing in breach of the legislation.