There is some good insights at archrights blog into the Marper judgement in the U.K., i.e. the decision to remove DNA of innocents from law enforcement databases. Check it out. Is your DNA stored somewhere, have you tried to have it removed?
Category: U.K.
Uncle C taken public by his wife on Facebook
This must be one of the most publicised examples of the damage of making personal life public in Facebook in the U.K. The man set to take the helm of MI6 in the UK in November is in trouble after it was discovered that his wife had posted practically every detail of their lives for all to see on Facebook. The privacy controls that are built into Facebook were not used effectively, if at all. The profile has since been removed.
Get back your DNA!
Thanks to a post from ARCH blog that give pointers onto how to reclaim your DNA. Are you one of the 800,000 innocent people who have been arrested in England, Wales or Northern Ireland that are thought to have their DNA and computer records retained? Find more information on how to reclaim your DNA at this website.
Personal data guardianship code
BCS have just realised something called personal data guardianship code. I haven’t read in any detail yet, but what I have read looks quite useful. Take a look.
Database State report
Excellent report by well-known subject matter experts in this field, including: Terri Dowty, Ian Brown and Ross Andersen. The report is commissioned by the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust Ltd.
Missile data, medical records found on discarded hard disks
Researchers bought 300 drives from eBay, other auction sites, second-hand stalls and car boot sales….. and just read what they found…
PROTECTING THE VIRTUAL CHILD: The Law and Children’s Consent to Sharing Personal Data
Interesting report from Terri Dowty, Director of ARCH and Professor Douwe Korff on behalf of ARCH/Nuffield Foundation in January 2009. The purpose of this report is to give an indication of current legal thinking on children’s ability to give informed consent to information sharing, both in the UK and in other EU countries. It is divided into two sections: the first of these deals with the law in the UK; the second is a comparative study of seven EU countries.
You need to ‘opt-out’ of Google Street View!
Street View UK is here to stay, says boss of Google MapsMike Harvey, Technology Correspondent, in San Francisco despite protests and formal complaints that accompanied its introduction in Britain last month. Google will continue to take pictures of the streets of Britain and put them online for its controversial Street View mapping service, the head of Google Maps has told The Times.
The company’s camera-equipped cars have been travelling around British streets since last year. The cars take images only on public roads and produce a seamless panoramic view of a particular street on a particular day.
Street View automatically blurs out images of people’s faces and car registrations, although the technology is not perfect. Anyone wishing to have images removed can contact Google which says most requests are processed within hours. Read more at the TimesOnLine.
Impotent Information Commissioner
The U.K. government has failed to meet its own deadlines to bring in new powers for the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) to fine companies who lose personal data. Read more..
U.K. workers private data sold
This is an amazing story in that it happened in the U.K., not the U.S. or somewhere else in the world where privacy legislation is somewhat lacking.
So despite the Data Protection (DPA) legislation in the U.K. There has now surfaced evidence (following a raid) of workers being blacklisted and their personal data stored by a consulting company to for the last 15 years to make this possible.
Around 40 construction companies who subscribed to the scheme would send lists of prospective employees to The Consulting Association, who would then warn them about potential troublemakers. Employers paid £3,000 as an annual fee, and £2.20 for individual details, the ICO said. Invoices to construction firms for up to £7,500 were also seized during the raid.
Not only was the database held without the workers’ consent, but the existence of it was repeatedly denied. This is a direct violation of U.K.s DPA.
Following the raid on 23 February, investigators discovered that the Consulting Association’s database contained the details of some 3,213 workers, the ICO said. Read more on BBC News.