The government's information commissionerRichard Thomashas said he is
horrified by the number of banks, government departments, public
bodies and other organisations that admitteddata breaches in the past
year.
He called for business and political leaders to take
responsibility for how they collect, process and store personal
information, in his
annual report published today. Getting it wrong could damage
their reputations in the short term and society in the long term,
he said.
According to the report, the percentage of individuals who are
aware of data protection rights has risen to 82% from 75% last
year, and awareness of freedom of information rights was 73%, which
was "astonishingly high for a new law", said Thomas.
Thomas, who was recently
reappointed until
2009, said the public had made more than 200,000 requests for
publicly-held information. Most were successful. In disputes, 75%
of the information commissioner's decisions were accepted by both
sides without appeal.
However, Thomas said, "Commercial and political pressures to
escalate the use of the electronic footprints we leave many times a
day become almost irresistible.
"The purposeful, routine and systematic recording of everyone's
movements activities and transactions in public and private spaces
- a
surveillance society - is fast becoming a reality. The dangers
are graver still as one system is linked to another. The risks -
such as mistaken identity, inaccurate or out-of-date information,
judgemental profiling - magnify as information is shared
ever-wider."
The ICO has issued a
draft data protection strategy for comment. The consultation
ends on 28 September.
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