Category: Freedom of Information

The Government has just published its ideas for allowing general access to data (which includes the intention to allow individuals on-line access to their own personal data). In general, I support this measure but sadly, the Open Data White Paper has not even considered that it has widened the privacy problems associated with “enforced subject access” (see references). In the White Paper, the Government states that it wants to make personal data available to the data subject by a secure portal.

I have to confess that I am just a normal type of guy who reads Hansard and watches the BBC’s Parliamentary Channel. The last (wet) bank-holiday weekend, for instance, there was a riveting repeat of Jack Straw’s evidence to the Justice Committee on the operation of the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act. As Home Secretary, Jack Straw was responsible for piloting the Data Protection and Freedom of Information Bills through Parliament; he knows where the legislative skeletons can be found.

The Information Tribunal has just adjudged that the names of three junior members of staff who had a part in an applicant’s complaint to the Financial Services Authority (FSA) can be disclosed as part of a Freedom of Information (FOI) request. The Information Rights Tribunal, following Durant, concluded that the names of these staff were not personal data. As every data protection aficionado knows, mentioning Durant is rather like swearing in public, as its application can result in bizarre conclusions;

Public authorities should be prepared that, if they are subject to enforcement action by the Information Commissioner  (e.g. Monetary Penalty Notice, Undertaking, Audit, Enforcement Notice etc), that internal reports into why the action was taken might become the target for FOI requests. This is the outcome of a recent Decision Notice involving the London Borough of Ealing. Implicitly, the ICO is signalling that he thinks such reports and investigations should be published where practicable. In February 2011, Ealing Council reported a

Bad news guys! I have just received my Tribunal Decision which throws out my attempt to find out what is wrong with the UK’s Data Protection Act. The Decision means that sixty million data subjects and one third of a million data controllers will not fully understand why the European Commission thinks that the UK’s implementation of Data Protection Act has been deficient since 2004. I think this is a shocking state of affairs. The result of this Decision is

Does the use of Gmail or Hotmail by a Minister's Private Office (in order to evade Freedom of Information (FOI) obligations) also lead to breaches in the Data Protection Act? Well, I can see how this could be the case. The press has raised this issue only in the context of FOI. Yesterday's Sunday Times, for example, noted that the allegations facing Michael Gove and his special adviser, Dominic Cummings, were that by using personal email accounts, they were assuming that any requested

I have just read the uncorrected transcript of the Information Commissioner’s (IC) evidence to MPs last week. There are several other important points which have been largely unreported; hence this blog. As well as the custodial section 55 offence (see last week’s blog), the IC wants a strengthened offence in the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). He also has serious doubts as to whether the changes in the Freedoms Bill (e.g. to CCTV, DNA, criminal record disclosure) will actually deliver