The
Government claims that the move will help the public sector to
deliver its services; but it is likely to heighten concern amongst
civil liberties campaigners already upset by the amount of
information the Government is gathering about citizens.
In a new paper from the Department of Constitutional Affairs, the
Government outlines its idea of what information should be shared
and with whom. Called the Information Sharing Vision Statement, the
document proposes that public sector bodies share more information
amongst themselves in order to better provide public services.
More controversially it proposes more sharing of information
with the private sector. Echoing the proposal of a recent green
paper consultation from the Home Office, it proposes that public
sector bodies use the private sector fraud database CIFAS to share
information.
"Public sector membership of CIFAS would allow for information
sharing on fraud between the private sector and the public sector,"
says the document. "The savings to the public purse have been
estimated to be between approximately £137m–£273m every year."
A similar proposal was made in the Home Office's paper New
Powers against Organised Crime and Financial Crime, which is open
to consultation until 17th October.
CIFAS is the system commonly used by the financial services
sector to identify instances of fraud. The proposal could combine
information about an individual's banking details and behaviour
with information about their social security and tax behaviour.
"The argument that is always made is that things like joined-up
Government and putting Government online and inter-agency
co-operation are dependent on quality data being shared within the
public sector," said William Malcolm, a data protection specialist
at Pinsent Masons, the law firm behind OUT-LAW.COM.
"The new element here is proposing that public sector bodies
join CIFAS, where they would have access to those private sector
data pots, but would contribute data too," he said. The shared
information would be used to help combat fraud and organised
crime.
"Sharing data for fraud prevention is of course a different
thing to sharing data for the purposes of service delivery," said
Malcolm. "However, moves towards increased cooperation give
ammunition to the privacy lobbies who paint a picture of an
Orwellian society where there is one great database with everything
in it."
"This Government wants to deliver the best possible support to
people in need. We can only do this with the right information
about people's circumstances," said Baroness Ashton, parliamentary
under secretary of state at the DCA in the introduction to its
vision statement. "We recognise that he more we share information,
the more important it is that people are confident that their
personal data is kept safe and secure. The Data Protection and
Human Rights Acts offer a robust statutory framework to maintain
those rights whilst sharing information to deliver better
services."
The Information Commissioner has already said that he wants to
see more public sector data sharing, but that privacy must be
carefully guarded. "I do not want data protection to be wrongly
blamed for preventing sensible information sharing, for example to
detect crime, protect children at risk or prevent fraud," said
Commissioner Richard Thomas in a statement when the Home Office
consultation paper was launched. "Trust and confidence will be lost
if information is inaccurate or out of date, if there are mistakes
of identification, if information is not kept securely or if
reasonable expectations of privacy are not met. And people must be
told how their information is being shared and given choices
wherever possible," he said.
Civil liberties group Liberty said that it is very concerned
about the new plans, which it thinks may require new primary
legislation to override the Data Protection Act. It said it expects
concrete proposals to emerge next spring.
"This Government treats our privacy as an inconvenience rather
than a fundamental right," said Gareth Crossman, Liberty’s Policy
Director. "Do we really want to become a society in which we must
prove why our personal details should not be shared?"
