Month: September 2021

Privacy Law Monthly Round Up – September 2021

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Headlines

Ben and Deborah Stokes’ privacy claim against The Sun for the highly intrusive article detailing traumatic events in the Stokes’ family past was settled on 30 August 2021, with the newspaper agreeing to publish an apology and pay substantial damages. Paul Wragg wrote about The Sun’s “nonsensical” defence for the Inforrm Blog, concluding that the only party spared the anguish of trial was the newspapers’ defence team.

Government and General legislative developments

The controversial Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill had its second reading in the House of Lords this month. The Bill is notorious for its proposed restrictions on peaceful protest, which critics have predicted will have a discriminatory impact and breach the rights to freedom of expression and assembly. Broadened police powers would also enable the extraction of more information from mobile phones.

The Age Appropriate Design Code (aka the “Children’s Code”) entered into force on 2 September 2021 following a one year transition period. The Children’s Code explains to businesses how the UK GDPR, Data Protection Act and Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations apply to the design and delivery of Information Society Services (“ISS”) – i.e social media, educational and gaming platforms – apply to children. The Children’s Code is the first of its kind worldwide, and has been welcomed by many as a positive development for keeping children safe online. The 15 standards that the Code sets can be found here.

Sticking with child safety online, Home Secretary Priti Patel launched a Safety Tech Challenge fund at the G7 meeting start of this month. Five applicants will be awarded up to £85,000 each to develop new technologies that enable to detection of child sexual abuse material online, without breaking end-to-end encryption.

The UK Government has launched a public consultation on data protection legislation reform following Brexit entitled Data: A new direction. The consultation is open until 19 November. Following the end of the Brexit transition period, the UK’s data protection regime, which had derived from the EU framework, will be transposed into domestic law known as the UK GDPR. The Government is seeking to use this opportunity to make some changes to the current regime. The Hawtalk Blog discusses how some of these proposals are unethical and unsafe. Further discussion can be found on the Panopticon Blog and the Data Protection report. 

Data Privacy and Data Protection

Cressida Dick, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, has accused tech giants of undermining terrorist prevention efforts by virtue of their focus on end-to-end encryption. Writing in The Telegraph on the twentieth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, she said that it is “impossible in some cases” for the police to fulfil their role to protect the public. Given the pressure on tech giants to ensure users’ privacy, companies are unlikely to reshape their platforms to facilitate more extensive monitoring.

Apple has delayed its plan to scan its users’ iCloud images for child sexual abuse material. The proposed detection technology would compare images before they are uploaded to iCloud against unique “digital fingerprints” of known child pornographic material maintained by the National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children. The plan was criticised by privacy groups because it involved using an individual’s own device to check if they were potentially engaged in criminal activity.

Surveillance

The Metropolitan Police have invested £3 million into new facial recognition technologies (FRT) that will greatly increase surveillance capabilities in the capital. The expansion of the Met’s technology will enable it to process historic images from CCTV feeds, social media and other sources in order to track down suspects. Critics argue that such FRT encroaches on privacy by “turning back the clock to see who you are, where you’ve been, what you have done and with whom, over many months or even years.” There is also concern that FRT can exacerbate existing racial discrimination in the criminal justice system. The UK’s Surveillance Camera Commissioner (SCC), Professor Fraser Sampson, has acknowledged that some FRT “are so ethically fraught” that it may only be appropriate to carry them out under license in the future.

NGO’s

Big Brother Watch published an opinion piece warning that the imposition of vaccine passports could reorganise Britain into a two-tier, checkpoint society. The article responds to the Scottish Parliament’s vote in favour of vaccine passports earlier this month. Wales has since followed Scotland and announced mandatory vaccination and COVID status check schemes. The English government has not yet committed to such a regime. The ICO has emphasised that data protection laws will not stand in the way of mandatory vaccination and COVID status checks, but rather facilitate responsible sharing of personal data where it is necessary to protect public health. 

Privacy International has considered how data-intensive systems and surveillance infrastructure, developed by national and foreign actors, in Afghanistan as part of developmental and counter-terrorism measures will fare under the Taliban regime.

From the regulator

ICO

The ICO has announced two fines this month;

  • A total of £495,000 was imposed against We Buy Any Car, Saga, and Sports Direct for sending more than 354 million “frustrating and intrusive” nuisance messages between them. None of the companies had permission to send recipients marketing emails or texts, making their behaviour illegal;
  • The Glasgow-based company DialADeal Scotland Ltd was fined £150,000 for the making of more than 500,000 nuisance marketing calls to recipients who had not given their permission to receive them.

The ICO has also released a communiqué from a meeting on data protection and privacy held by the G7 authorities at the start of the month. The meeting is closely aligned with the Roadmap for Cooperation on Data Free Flow with Trust announced by G7 Digital and Technology Ministers on 28 April 2021.

IPSO

IPSO has published a number of privacy rulings and resolutions;

IMPRESS

There were no IMPRESS rulings relating to privacy this month.

Cases

The Inforrm Blog has published an article detailing the continued decline in privacy injunction applications in England and Wales for 2021. There were only three applications in the first six months of the year, down from ten in 2020. All three applications were successful. Only 4% of the new issued cases on the Media and Communications List related to misuse of private information or breach of privacy.

No judgements relating to privacy have been handed down this month.

Written by Colette Allen

Colette Allen has hosted “Newscast’” on The Media Law Podcast with Dr Thomas Bennett and Professor Paul Wragg since 2018. She has recently finished the BTC at The Inns of Court College of Advocacy and will be starting a MSc in the Social Sciences of the Internet at the University of Oxford in October 2021.

Healthcare data and data protection in the time of coronavirus – Olivia Wint

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The processing of special category personal data (including health data e.g. vaccination status, blood type, health conditions etc) was a common topic before the COVID-19 pandemic (the “pandemic”), with various resources published that explored this topic.

For example, the European Data Protection Board (“EDPB”) published an adopted opinion on the interplay between the Clinical Trials Regulation and the General Data Protection Regulation* (“GDPR”) (23January 2019), the Information Commissioner’s Office (“ICO”) posted a blog on why special category personal data needs to be handled even more carefully (14 November 2019) and the ICO published guidance on the lawful basis for processing special category data compliance with the GDPR (November 2019).

The pandemic has brought about a number of data protection considerations, all of which were already in existence but exacerbated by the pandemic (employee monitoring, contact tracing, workforce shift from office to home etc.) One that is more prevalent than ever before is the processing of health data, this piece aims to cover some key data protection themes and practical insights into the processing of health data.  

Health data, a subset of special category personal data by its very nature comes with an increased risk profile.  When processing this data type, not only are there legislative data protection requirements, the expectation of good clinical governance practices but also regulatory body considerations too.                                                           

For example, the NHS Care Quality Commission have in place a code of practice on confidential personal information, the NHS Health Research Authority have in place GDPR guidance specifically for researchers and study coordinators and technical guidance for those responsible for information governance within their organisation and the NHS more generally, has in place it’s Data Security and Protection Toolkit (the “Toolkit”). The Toolkit is an online self-assessment tool that enables organisations to measure and publish their performance against the National Data Guardian’s ten data security standards. The Toolkit covers records management and retention, training and awareness, system vulnerability management and crisis management to name a few.                                                                  

The above is all on a national level (UK), on an international level, there are data protection laws which specifically cover health data such as HIPAA in the US, the Patient Data Protection Act in Germany, and various provincial health data privacy laws in Canada such as the Health Information Act in Alberta.

Whilst the previous paragraph highlights the complexities of processing health data whether on a national and international level in comparison to other data types, there are a number of mitigations that organisations can put in place to adequately reduce the risks associated with processing this type of data. Mitigations such as Data Protection Impact Assessments (“DPIAs”), updated privacy notices and appropriate security measures amongst other things should all be considered.

Many organisations that never historically processed health data may now do so as a result of the pandemic…

Covering your bases

The first base that must be covered when processing data is ensuring that an appropriate legal basis has been established for each data processing activity, so for example if health data is processed for employee monitoring and research, a legal basis for both of these activities will need to be established. Legal bases can include for the performance of a contract, for legitimate interests** of the organisation and/or in order to perform a legal obligation.  Where processing of health data is concerned an additional category under Article 9 of the UK GDPR must be met. In the healthcare context, applicable additional categories may include explicit consent, health or social care purposes, public health purposes and/or archiving research and statistical purposes. 

Many organisations that never historically processed health data may now do as a result of the pandemic or alternatively organisations that processed health data pre-pandemic may now be doing so in larger amounts, organisations that fit either side of the coin should also assess the extent to which their privacy notice(s) have been updated and/or need to be updated in order to make data subjects aware any applicable data processing changes and to comply with transparency obligations.

Next, large scale processing of health data may pose a ‘high risk to the rights and freedoms of natural persons’ and in such cases, will trigger the requirement of a DPIA. In order for a DPIA to have value, it is important for organisations to ensure that the DPIA is assessed and considered early on to ensure privacy by design and default is incumbent of any system or processing activity.

A DPIA will assess the likelihood and severity of harm related to the processing activity in question and should the DPIA identify a high risk with no available mitigations, consultation with the ICO will be needed. The ICO has set out a 9-step lifecycle for the DPIA, all of which should be considered before any data processing has taken place:

  1. Identify a need for a DPIA;
  2. Describe the processing;
  3. Consider consultation;
  4. Assess necessity and proportionality;
  5. Identify and assess risks;
  6. Identify measures to mitigate risk;
  7. Sign off and record outcomes;
  8. Integrate outcomes into plan; and
  9. Keep under review.

Internally, organisations should have appropriate technical and organisational measures in place which reflects the risk presented. In relation to technical measures, appropriate internal controls and security measures should be utilised. Organisations may wish to consider a myriad and combination of controls to ensure that health data has the best level of protection, this may include end to end encryption for data both in transit and at rest, role-based access within organisations and the adoption and accreditation of industry recognised security standards such as ISO 27001.

In respect of organisational measures, it may be apt for training and awareness sessions to be implemented with tailored training administered to employees that will doing data processing activities and a robust policy suite in place which covers key circumstances such as data breaches and business continuity.

Data sharing

A specific data processing activity that may be utilised more in the wake of the pandemic is that of data sharing between organisations for information and research purposes. In the England, the soon to be implemented GP Data Sharing Scheme aims to improve and create a new framework for creating a central NHS digital database from GP records and the UK’s Department of Health and Social Care (“DHSC”) has recently published a draft policy paper titled ‘Data saves lives: reshaping health and social care with data’. The policy covers the aspiration of the DHSC to introduce new legislation as part of the Health and Care Bill (currently at Committee stage) to encourage data sharing between private health providers and the NHS and have more guard rails around the sharing of data generally through mandating standards for how data is collected and stored.

With data sharing as evidenced by the above, is something that will be advocated for and welcomed in due course, it is important that organisations have in place the appropriate contractual and practical measures to protect data as data in motion is when it is most vulnerable. Contractual measures include ensuring data sharing and/or transfer agreements are in place which cover all necessary contractual provisions and provide adequate assurances as to the data sharing/transfer arrangements. The NHSX has published a template Data Sharing Agreement which has been labelled as suitable for use by all health and care organisations and includes risk management, legal basis and confidentiality and privacy provisions amongst other things. Practical measures include conducting due diligence checks on all organisations which may be in receipt of data as part of the data sharing process (including third parties) and anonymising/ pseudonymising data. The ICO has put in place a comprehensive data sharing checklist which invites organisations to consider data minimisation, accountability and data subject rights.

The pandemic has changed the world that we knew it in more ways than one and in the context of processing of health data, what seems to be certain is that the processing of health data is on the rise. As such, organisations should continue to monitor guidance and developments in this area and ensure data protection principles are at the core of all data processing activities as a first port of call.

* EDPB guidelines are no longer directly relevant to the UK data protection regime and are not binding under the UK regime.

** A legitimate interest assessment should be considered when relying on legitimate interest as a lawful basis.

Olivia Wint is a seasoned data protection professional, with over five years experience in this area. Olivia has worked in a range of sectors including local authority, third sector, start-ups and the Big 4 advising on all aspects of data protection compliance.

Big Brother Watch publishes The State of Free Speech Online Report

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Government surveillance interest group Big Brother Watch has released an insightful Report entitled: The State of Free Speech Online.

The Report looks at crucial provisions of the English Government’s proposed Online Safety Bill, critiquing its impact on freedom of speech.

The Report in particular focuses on social media platforms and the impact of the Bills provisions on their ability to facilitate free speech.

TPP supports free speech unequivocally, recognising that in a democratic society both rights of free speech and the protection of ones private life must be carefully balanced and safeguarded.

The recent move of Facebook in removing the publication of third parties Australian news from its site in protest to the provisions of the proposed News Media Bargaining Code, in doing so lobbying the Australian government, serves to highlight the unequal bargaining position of online platforms and their extensive influence.  

Furthermore, Twitter permanently suspending then US President Donald Trump highlighted the ability of a platform to  operate at the highest levels as arbiters of free speech.

It serves to bring into sharp relief the need for proper safeguards and guidelines of, as the Report states, private companies who “wield power… comparable to that of governments”.

As arbiters of free speech companies such as Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and Twitter hold substantive sway over millions of conversations where the rights of free speech and those of privacy intersect. This Report is a welcome examination of the coming reforms in the Online Safety Bill through a lens of safeguarding free speech.

It argues that enforcement of free speech rights have been “questionable, inconsistent and problematic” across the platforms. It goes on to opine that such platforms need to mirror the rule of law and reflect human rights principles.

As English law moves to take the next step in regulating the activities of those online via the Online Safety Bill TPP with be reporting focusing on both sides of the free speech and privacy debate.