Concerns over security of national ID register

By Isabelle Chaize

A committee of peers and MPs, the Lords and Commons Joint Committee on Human Rights, have raised question marks about the safety of the Governments proposed ID register, which will be needed for their ID card scheme as well as biometric passports.

The committee’s concerns have been fueled by the recent series of incidents in which various Government departments lost confidential data. In their report, they mentioned 18 occasions on which they had previously shown doubts about the adequacy of data protection in Government bills.

Tellingly, one of their original concerns was the ‘inadequacy of safeguards relating to HMRC information sharing powers’ - the HM Revenue and Customs Department was in fact responsible for the loss of 25 million private records of child benefit claimants.

Andrew Dismore, chairman of the committee, thought the loss was shocking, and said that in future information needed to be handled ‘as sensitively and carefully as hard cash’.

The human rights watchdog said that they ‘intend to take a close interest in the government’s detailed proposals for the national identity register as and when they emerge.’

The committee were adamant that the privacy of data should be guaranteed by both the Data Protection Act and the European Convention on Human Rights.

They criticised Michael Wills, who as Justice Minister is responsible for data protection and human rights, for not being proactive enough when it came to security issues. The minister had previously said that it did not fall into his personal area to ensure other departments obeyed the law.

Among other concerns raised was the role of specially appointed ‘human rights champions’ - of whom it had never heard, causing doubts about their effectiveness.

Dismore said that ‘The government must demonstrate that it appreciates the seriousness of what needs to be done.’

‘The fundamental problem is a cultural one. There has been a rapid increase in the amount of data sharing in the public sector, which can be useful, important and necessary, but this has not been matched by the even more necessary strong commitment to safeguard the right to respect for privacy.’

In order to deal with these issues the report demanded all primary legislation in which data protection might be an issue should contain detailed rules which ‘help ensure that data protection becomes a primary concern of managers and frontline staff in the public sector’.