UK Information Commissioner reprimands Charnwood Borough Council for disclosing the new address of a domestic abuse victim to her ex partner. Meanwhile in Australia there is a serious data breach involving 11,000 records of National Disability Insurance Agency.
November 30, 2023
Government departments and agencies are notorious for sending without thinking and causing a privacy breach. Often times it is a list of individuals. The UK Information Commissioner in Charnwood Borough Council disclosed the new address of a domestic abuse victim. To her ex partner! It arose from an administrative bungle, with a letter being sent to the previous address of the victim, which she shared with her ex and at which he still resided. The ex read the letter. The UK Information Commissioner reprimanded the Council for this breach.
The ICO’s media release provides:
The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has issued a reprimand to Charnwood Borough Council after it disclosed the new address of a domestic abuse victim to her ex-partner.
The ICO has called on other organisations to learn lessons from the incident to ensure they are not at risk of making the same mistake.
They should make sure:
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- Alerts are put on files if staff need to be especially vigilant when someone is a vulnerable service user
- A proper process is in place for address changes
- Data protection training is carried out, including refresher training.
In this case, the council’s process for updating addresses was not clear. A letter detailing the new address of the victim was sent to the previous address she shared with her ex-partner. The letter was later confirmed to have been opened and read by the ex-partner. Read the rest of this entry »