Category: Data Protection

Can you remember those intelligence test questions of the form: “X is to Y” as “C is to D?”.  Well here’s a new one: “Robespierre’s Committee of Public Safety is to democracy” as the “European Union’s Freedom, Security and Justice Directorate is to privacy”. Whereas the former willingly silenced dissenting voices by removing heads at Madame Guillotine, the latter is wilfully cutting out any basic data protection requirements when making binding international agreements. Given the considerable democratic deficit in the

If readers want to examine an interesting example of how to manage a data loss, have a look at what happened at the London Borough of Barnet (see references). A data loss involving 9,000 children followed a burglary of the home of a member of staff. The loss included the Council’s computer equipment (a laptop), CD Roms and memory sticks along with other items from the house. Like most organisations, the Council had implemented procedures and policies to ensure that

If ever you wanted an example of why there should be an express linkage between the Human Rights Act (HRA) and the Data Protection Act (DPA), then consider the front page lead of last weekend’s Sunday Times (followed by other newspapers such as the Daily Mail). It reported that the police were using automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cameras to collect millions of car number plates, dates and times when cars passed the cameras and keeping the resultant personal data

According to a press release issued at midnight, yesterday, regulations have been tabled before Parliament to allow a complete set of toe-prints to be added to the list of ID Card biometrics (see references below). The Government also claim that the new biometric will allow for shorter queuing time at airport security as anyone who is requested to take their shoes off (e.g. when passing through airport security scanners or a whole body scanner) will be able to have their

The Government has decided to mandate the processing of excessive personal data and expose more young adults to ID theft. How? Just read on. Just imagine you run a night-club that requires a licence to sell alcohol. A new law, enacted using Ministerial powers (thus ensuring limited Parliamentary scrutiny) requires you to have an “age verification policy” that “applies to the premises in relation to the sale or supply of alcohol”. In addition, that “policy must require individuals who appear

Whilst reading excerpts of Hansard to children at bed-time (it works a treat – they soon become bored and drop off to sleep), I became aware of an element of Labour’s strategy for the forthcoming General Election. In essence, it is: “Labour fights crime with more CCTV and an extensive DNA database”. No doubt, when senior police officers are interviewed on the telly about these subjects, they will sagely nod their heads and say something like: “Yes please. We really

Evidence that the Government’s flagship ID Card programme is looking for a rationale for its own existence was given by Meg Hillier, Home Office Minister in charge of the increasingly costly development. Speaking to journalists and industry representatives in Westminster this week, Hillier said that the private sector "needs to take on a roll of provisioning a broader variety of services" based on the use of the ID Card and associated database. Our Meg compared ID cards to the Apple

Ten days ago, the Home Secretary announced that members of the public can make applications for disclosure from police records about anybody who is in contact with children.  The Home Secretary’s decision was justified by Home Office research (and not made in order to catch a headline before the General Election campaign). The scheme is going nationwide starting in August. However, after looking at the research report (see reference below), I believe that no data protection analysis or privacy impact

Just imagine. You get caught up in the general fracas as millions queue to watch Barnsley play football at the weekend. You are arrested and a DNA sample is taken which is then matched against DNA found at other crime scenes. No match is found and the police take no further action after your arrest. The Government say that these DNA personal data should be retained for six years; two Parliamentary Committees have just said that there is no evidence