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Google is not a library, Dr Cavoukian
The outgoing Ontario Information and Privacy Commissioner Ann Cavoukian, whose time in office has been hugely, and globally, influential (see in particular Privacy by Design) has co-written (with...
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We’re looking into it
The news is awash with reports that the UK Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) is “opening an investigation” into Facebook’s rather creepy research experiment, in conjunction with US universities,...
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DVLA, disability and personal data
Is the DVLA’s online vehicle-checker risking the exposure of sensitive personal data of registered keepers of vehicles? The concept of “personal data”, in the Data Protection Act 1998 (DPA) (and,...
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Do bloggers need to register with the ICO?
A strict reading of data protection law suggests many (if not all) bloggers should register with the ICO, even though the latter disagrees. And, I argue, the proposal for an Information Rights Levy...
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ICO indicates that (non-recreational) bloggers must register with them
I think I am liable to register with the ICO, and so are countless others. But I also think this means there needs to be a debate about what this, and future plans for levying a fee on data...
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Dancing to the beat of the Google drum
With rather wearying predictability, certain parts of the media are in uproar about the removal by Google of search results linking to a positive article about a young artist. Roy Greenslade, in the...
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The Crown Estate and behavioural advertising
A new app for Regent Street shoppers will deliver targeted behavioural advertising – is it processing personal data? My interest was piqued by a story in the Telegraph that Regent Street is set to...
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Russell Brand and the domestic purposes exemption in the Data Protection Act
Was a now-deleted tweet by Russell Brand, revealing a journalist’s private number, caught by data protection law? Data protection law applies to anyone who “processes” (which includes “disclosure…by...
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The wrong test for anonymisation?
In February this year I asked the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) to investigate reports that Hospital Episode Statistics (HES) data had apparently been sold to an actuarial society by the NHS...
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Are we all journalists?
The ICO has said that Global Witness can claim the data protection exemption for journalism, regarding their investigations in BSGR. This fascinating case continues to raise difficult and important...
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A data protection justice gap?
On the 4th March the Supreme Court handed down judgment in the conjoined cases of Catt and T v Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis ([2015] UKSC 9). Almost unanimously (there was one dissenting...
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Vidal-Hall v Google, and the rise of data protection ambulance-chasing
Everyone knows the concept of ambulance chasers – personal injury lawyers who seek out victims of accidents or negligence to help/persuade the latter to make compensation claims. With today’s judgment...
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Any Safe Harbor in a storm…?
The ICO has contacted me to say that it actually selected SnapSurveys because they offered clients the option of hosting survey response on UK servers, and it has checked with SnapSurveys that this...
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Why what Which did wears my patience thin
Pre-ticked consent boxes and unsolicited emails from the Consumers’ Association Which?, the brand name of the Consumers’ Association, publishes a monthly magazine. In an era of social media, and online...
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