Category: News

Xmas has come and to get you in the festive mood, I present a link to 232 pages of gripping holiday reading. Forget all those TV repeats over the holiday period; in the forthcoming break why not snuggle down with the latest DAPIX version of the Data Protection Regulation which identifies the current thinking of Member States. I have made two preliminary conclusions: • I think that the Data Protection Regulation will not be agreed until the end of 2015 (if that); this

For the last two years I've been working with colleagues in the Cabinet Office's Privacy and Consumer Advisory Group to develop privacy principles for the government's online identity assurance programme. This is now close to launch, and got some front-page attention in The Times on Monday. Here is the just-published letter we sent to the newspaper with more details. The Government Digital Service has also published a response. Sir, Today’s Times (4/11/2014) front-page story contains an error: “Virtual ID for

All through the New Labour Surveillance decade (and through to the current Snowdon revelations), Parliament and public have been deliberately kept in the dark as to why the UK’s Data Protection Act (DPA) is not a proper implementation of Directive 95/45/EC. What is wrong with this implementation? It’s an official secret. However, the MoJ have just told me (see references) that the deficiencies are apparently so great that the European Commission is still thinking of infraction proceedings. The above, of

Yesterday, the Intelligence and Security Committee held a round-table on privacy and national security; in particular in relation to the Snowdon revelations and possible changes to the law. So this is a good excuse to publish my written evidence to the Committee. It is on the lines that the Data Protection Act should apply to the processing of personal data by the national security agencies. Historically the national security function was made exempt from the Data Protection Act 1984 probably

I suspect the Government is going to ditch the Law Commission recommendations on data sharing; this is because it wants a quick implementation of its own extensive data sharing proposals. In short, general data sharing powers are now on the political agenda again. This is the third time in a decade that Government has tried to obtain data sharing powers that apply in circumstances unconnected with the usual suspects (e.g. data sharing in relation to crime, national security and law

In 1805, William Pitt the Younger, after hearing about Napoleon's victory at the Battle of Austerlitz is reported to have said: "Roll up that map (of Europe): it will not be wanted these ten years". Well I have attended two meetings which suggest that the European Union has already rolled up its Data Protection Map of Europe so it excludes the UK. The main reason for this? Anticipation of a likely UK withdrawal from European Union after the next General

In yesterday’s blog, I suggested that the haste for the Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Bill (DRIP) was because of intended legal action; it looks as if my hunch is more than 50% correct. Secondly, I also said that the statements made by Government in relation to data protection, the national security functions and these emergency measures were complete rubbish; the ICO at his Annual Report launch yesterday confirmed that the protections afforded to data subjects by the Data Protection Act

I have just read the Explanatory Notes and the clauses in “The Data Retention and Investigatory Powers (DRIP) Bill” which is being rushed through Parliament this week. According to Ministers, the Bill is primarily to allow the national security agencies and the police continued access to communications data and the content of communications because the European Court of Justice struck out the Data Retention Directive (on the grounds that the Directive provisions facilitated mass indiscriminate surveillance). According to Ministers, the Bill is