UK: One in four government websites illegal

[Pat McCotter]

From the UK:
One in four government websites illegal
By Tom Whitehead, Home Affairs Editor
Last Updated: 5:50PM GMT 22 Mar 2009

One in four Government databases are illegal under human rights or data protection and should be scrapped immediately, a panel of experts have warned.

Another six in ten have "significant problems and may be unlawful" while just one in eight are given a clean bill of health.

The UK has become the "most invasive surveillance state, and the worst at protecting privacy, of any Western democracy", the most detailed study yet on data collection reveals.

Systems including the DNA database, National Identity Register, the children's ContactPoint index and the NHS Detailed Care Record are "fundamentally flawed", they conclude.

The scathing report says a quarter of public sector databases are either disproportionate, run without consent, have no legal basis or have major privacy or operational problems.

In a wide-ranging attack, it warns children are most at risk from "Britain's Database State" and that data sharing is now creating a barrier to socially responsible activities.

The report, commissioned by the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust, is the first comprehensive review of Britain's major databases.

It will fuel fresh accusations that the Government is marching Britain headfirst in to a surveillance society and personal data being readily shared between public bodies or help snoop on the public with virtually no control.

But the experts, specialists in information policy, revealed senior civil servants and politicians now also see the personal data issue as "career threatening and toxic".

One author, Professor Ross Anderson of Cambridge University, said: "Britain's database state has become a financial, ethical and administrative disaster which is penalising some of the most vulnerable members of our society. It also wastes billions of pounds a year and often damages service delivery rather than improving it.

"There must be urgent and radical change in the public-sector database culture so that the state remains our servant, not our master, and becomes competent to deliver appropriate public services that genuinely support and protect the people who most need its help."

Another, Ian Brown of the Oxford Internet Institute, said:"The UK needs information systems that support citizens and professionals on a human scale, rather than multi-billion pound centralised databases used to stigmatise and snoop."

The report, Database State, said the Government's obsession has left officials "struggling to control billions of records of our most personal details".

It said more than £16 billion a year is spent on public sector IT and another £105bn will be spent over the next five years but less than a third of such projects ever succeed.

It said there are thousands of databases operating and the Government does not even now the precise number.

The study reviewed 46 flagship databases and found just six were effective, proportionate and necessary.

Using a traffic light system, it gave 11 databases a red light, meaning they are "almost certainly illegal under human rights or data protection law and should be scrapped or substantially redesigned".

The "red" list includes the DNA database, which is already under review after the European Court of Human Rights ruled the blanket retention of samples of innocent people was a breach of their rights.

Others include the National Identity Register, which will store personal information linked to ID cards, and ContactPoint, the planned national index of all children in England.

Another 29 databases were found to be "amber" meaning they have "significant problems and may be unlawful".

The report warns data is increasingly centralised and shared between bodies but that the benefits of such sharing are often "illusory" and can in fact harm the most vulnerable.

It said three of the largest databases set up to support and protect children fail in their aims.

Co-author Terri Dowty of Action on Rights for Children said: "Children have never been so weighed, measured, graded, monitored and discussed. The state hovers over them like an over-anxious parent constantly looking for problems, but this level of intrusion into children's private and family lives simply cannot be justified on the basis of good intentions."

The report said: "All aspects of our lives will be surrounded by masses of data collected without our consent and shared well beyond the purposes for which they were originally collected.

"Citizens are starting to realise this and are progressively losing trust in Government."

Recommendations to address the problems include:

:: Respect for human rights and data protection, so that sensitive information is only shared with the subject's consent or subject to clearly-defined legal rules that are proportionate and necessary in a democratic society

:: The right for citizens to access most public services anonymously

:: Litigants bringing cases on human rights to be shielded from paying costs.

Shadow Justice Minister, Eleanor Laing said: "This damning report documents the sea change in the relationship between the individual citizen and the state in the last decade under this government.

"The Government must urgently adopt a principled, proportionate, less centralised approach to collecting personal information that takes real account of our privacy and is based on the consent of individuals and families."

Phil Booth, National Coordinator of NO2ID campaign said: "This survey shows just how vast the database state has grown while your back was turned. It threatens the privacy, personal security and freedom of everyone in the UK.

"Government now sees collecting and collating information about the people as a primary function: snooping is the first resort. To stop the database state, the surveillance reflex must be changed."