UK official calls for international privacy standards
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After a spate of disputes between the U.S. and the European Union over privacy safeguards, the U.K.'s information commissioner is calling for international harmonization of data-protection rules.
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Tells gov: think before you act The Information Commissioner has published some advice for government bodies that want to share information but think data protection laws prevent them from doing so.â¦
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Britain's counter-terrorism efforts are "in the wrong century", the head of Interpol said on Monday, accusing it of failing to share information on terrorists and consult a key database of the world police body.
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European data protection officials have written to Google warning that the search giant may be in breach of E.U. privacy because of the way it retains data on individual searches.
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The government needs to ensure greater protection for people's personal information, a think-tank  warns.
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Tories warn of "state snooping'' as greater sharing of private data between Whitehall departments is planned.
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Privacy International wants Google to acknowledge and apologize for 'hostility' to customer privacy.
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Threatens Data Protection Act? The government has set out its "vision" for helping the disadvantaged of British society by sharing intelligence about them across the public sector.â¦
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The UK could "sleepwalk into a surveillance society" as a result of ID cards, the Information commissioner has warned. Send us your views.
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Shouldn't be added as an afterthought Government needs to make privacy and data protection principles a core component of its IT specifications, according to the assistant information commissioner.â¦
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The UK government will store electronic records of people entering the UK in effort to tighten border control.
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The Net giants incur the wrath of Privacy International, and eBay draws the attention of the U.K.'s Information Commissioner.
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'Basic rights need to be guaranteed' in the third pillar The EU's data protection watchdog has warned that European officials are in danger of eroding basic data protection principles and has called on them to reconsider their actions.â¦
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Europe&#39;s top data protection official, European Data Protection Supervisor Peter Hustinx, criticized plans to create a European equivalent of the PNR (passenger name records) gathered by U.S. authorities, questioning the plan&#39;s necessity and proportionality.&quot;The fight against terrorism can be a legitimate ground to apply exceptions to the fundamental rights to privacy and data protection, but only within certain limits,&quot; Hustinx said in a statement on Thursday.&quot;The necessity of intended measures must be supported by clear and undeniable elements, and their proportionality must be demonstrated. These two aspects are essential conditions and they are clearly not fulfilled in this case,&quot; he said.The U.S. introduced PNR gathering in the wake of the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. After some initial resistance, the European Union agreed to allow airlines to hand over to American authorities details about passengers flying from the E.U. to the U.S., before a flights&#39; departure.Since then, Madrid and London have been attacked by suicide bombers, stiffening the resolve of European politicians to tighten security further.Last month the European Commission proposed a raft of pan-E.U. antiterrorism measures, including a PNR gathering system for all flights into the E.U. Under the proposed plan, air carriers would be obliged to hand over 19 pieces of passenger information, including the name, address, passport number, credit-card number, and history of changes in any flight schedule. The data would be retained for up to 13 years and be shared between authorities in all E.U. member states.This is very similar to the shape of the PNR agreement reached with the U.S. in June. Airlines have to hand over 19 details about passengers on flights to the U.S., and the U.S. authorities can keep the information for up to 15 years.Hustinx said the E.U. PNR plan would have &quot;a major impact on privacy and data protection rights of air passengers.&quot;He also criticized the agreement for its lack of clarity. In particular, he pointed out that the Commission&#39;s proposal doesn&#39;t say what the applicable legal framework for the plan would be, doesn&#39;t specify which authorities should have access to the data and fails to give rules on transferring passenger data outside of the E.U.Hustinx urged E.U. lawmakers to delay the PNR plan until after the recently agreed Lisbon Treaty comes into force, which is expected within the next year once each member state ratifies it in its national parliament.The treaty would force the Council of national governments to reach agreement with the European Parliament on the PNR plan. Currently the Council can decide on the matter by itselfMany parliamentarians are bitterly opposed to the E.U./U.S. PNR agreement and to the E.U. PNR plan.The European Commission wasn&#39;t immediately available to comment on Hustinx&#39;s comments.
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On Saturday, a London-based privacy advocacy group, Privacy International, released the preliminary results of a six-month survey of Internet privacy practices. The organization evaluated 23 Internet companies on several criteria, and assigned each company a color-coded privacy assessment, ranging from green (&quot;privacy-friendly and privacy enhancing&quot;) to black (&quot;comprehensive consumer surveillance & entrenched hostility to privacy&quot;).
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We'll hide all the blank disks, promise The Data Sharing Review - announced by Gordon Brown after the loss of 25m records from the child benefit database - is calling for input into how government departments and businesses use and share private information about British people.â¦
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BRUSSELS -- IP addresses, strings of numbers that identify computers on the Internet, should generally be regarded as personal information, the head of the European Union's group of data privacy regulators said Monday.