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LAST YEAR, THE Data Protection Commissioner dealt with 1,349 new complaints – a record figure for Billy Hawkes’s office.
During the 12-month period, 606 complaints about unsolicited direct marketing through text messages, phone calls and emails were received. A total of 369 reports were made about the one issue.
Many of the businesses involved in such advertising are unaware of the law which applied to communications, according to Hawkes.
In the course of the year, a total of 40 audits and inspections were carried out by the office. That included a probe of the public sector’s information system (INFOSYS) during which “serious abuse” was detected in terms of inappropriate employee access.
The office found that the Department of Social Protection has good monitoring systems in place for identifying any staff member inappropriately accessing records held. However, the external agencies provided with access to the system “did not always demonstrate the same good practices”.
INFOSYS is a read-only portal allowing access to social welfare databases which include information on individuals, partners and their dependants.
“A worrying degree of inappropriate access to INFOSYS by state employees was detected as a result of the investigation,” said the report.
Explanations for the inappropriate views by users ranged from the “bizarre to the banal”: from the posting of Christmas cards and Mass cards to the reason of nothing other than ‘pure curiousity’ being cited in cases where family, neighbours’ and friends’ records were accessed.
The HSE was singled out by Hawkes as his office uncovered cases that indicated a lack of awareness among staff as to what constituted inappropriate access.
“The report reveals a disturbing failure of governance in some of the public bodies investigated,” the Commissioner outlined this morning. “Data sharing can bring benefits in terms of efficient delivery of public services. But it must be done in a way that respects the rights of individuals to have their personal data treated with care and not accessed or used without good reason.”
One of the reasons given by HSE employees was that they had “consent” of a family member. However, one employee searched the social welfare records of their son’s girlfriend.
Celebrities of interest
A separate investigation into the use of An Garda Síochána’s PULSE system has also revealed “inappropriate access”. An ad-hoc, on-the-spot inspection of usage and access in relation to a substantial number of public figures and celebrities who were recorded as victims or witnesses was undertaken.
At least two high-profile figures had their records accessed more than 80 and 50 times respectively by members of the force.
In addition, the number of PULSE accesses returned on the records of three high-profile media personalities and a well known inter-county GAA player “appeared to bear no relation to the valid entries relating to these individuals in connection with official police business”.
A new auditing system that was put in place following the matter being raised by the Office of the Data Protection Commissioner will be examined this year.
In 2012, eleven separate bodies were involved in 200 prosecutions by the ODPC. Three insurance firms were prosecuted after social welfare data was found on insurance claim files. They had been obtained by private investigators.
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The privatisation of waste collection is biting hard it seems. It also getting harder and harder to find a public bin to dispose of the odd choc ice wrapper.
@Padraig Grimes: The privatization of any essential services are have been proved to be an absolute disaster. To many greedy people draining the finances to line their own pockets, with bonuses, expenses ect ect ect.
@Colette Kearns: you said it, just look at England.
@Padraig Grimes: the problem is the dirty Irish. In particular the durty dubs.
Well those who dumped in the mountains were hardly looking for bins.
@Mary King: no, and I’m not defending public dumping, but just maybe they can’t afford a private bin collection.
@Padraig Grimes: to be fair there are alot of people pleading poverty who have no problem working out for TV subscriptions and pizza.
How badly littered is Ireland? Join us at OpenLitterMap.com – it’s like Pokémon Go for Tidy Towns
I lived in Australia for a number of years. They did not privatise the bins. Its is paid for through their house tax (rates). One a year the council do a large items collection, they give your neighbourhood a weeks notice and you leave all your large rubbish out (beds, furniture etc) and its taken…… This results in zero dumpling, until we so the same dumpling will continue. Id rather pay the government 400 euro a year for this service than a private bin company.
@George Weener: this is Ireland, we get no service for the family home tax.
@George Weener: but I like dumplings!
Block the scenic roads with a metal barrier like Coilte
Pay for a tag to let you through and it is then recorded
Goodnight to the major dumpers
@Quentin Moriarty: like the tag for the toll. Who is passing through there to view the scenery at night when most fly tipping happens ?
Revenue from the tags is ring fences to maintain the area
@Quentin Moriarty:
That’s way too logic. How dare you.
Waste being dumped on one hand, litter bins being removed by council’s on the other, spotted two very ignorant car drivers throwing their cigarettes out the windows, needless to say they weren’t too enthusiastic when I gave them my middle finger as I passed them in traffic in the city link road in traffic on my motorcycle yesterday.
@Charles Coughlan: well done for confronting them. Perhaps an open paper bag of butts thrown in would help them understand
Disgusting behaviour. Why on earth isnt domestic refuse collection incorporated into LPT? Why does every byway, village and estate have multiple companies collecting waste on different days, spewing out multiples of the CO2 that should be (more carbon tax anyone? says our wise government) and snarling up traffic? Why am i paying through the nose for all this when everyone should be paying their fair share and designated geographical areas should be efficently allocated to different waste collection companies with the savings passed on?….the answer has just come to me, its Ireland and the lunatics are in charge of the asylum.
@daniel casey: Been preaching exactly this formula for years, but no one in the ivory towers seem bothered. The refuse truck crews can identify the households & business premises that don’t have an approved bin service, but no one in authority canvasses that mine of information. Plus, the licensed companies, most of which are slicing their revenues off shore tax exempt, are only interested in subscribers with bank accounts to direct debit, or who are diligent in the prepayment top up system.
And as for the residual public space refuse service, it is also an uncoordinated shambles, very poorly managed, with vans & personnel buzzing hither & thither, never full, & never to be seen for weeks, or any afternoons.
Autumn leaves still mushed on paths & in drains late January throughout Dublin!
Littering in the mountains and countryside is epidemic. And it’s not being done by those who ‘can’t pay’ for bin services – just by those who are too greedy to pay.
Bin services were originally paid for through taxes, and they should be again. The cost of remediation must be huge under the current regime…
If there was anything more than lip service being paid to the disgusting fly tipping epidemic, domestic refuse charges would be part of LPT. The current system is ridiculous and incentivises illegal dumping. We’re going to be taxed to the hilt for carbon in a few years and yet every estate and byway in the land has two or three different companies carrying out refuse collections, each spewing out CO2 and holding up traffic. Who is responsible for this crazy system? Government get your act together, get the cheaters paying through LPT, allocate designated geographical areas to different waste collection companies and pass on the savings to consumers. Oh, i almost forgot….this is Ireland, the inbeciles in charge will never let that happen.
Only Dirt Bags that would do that..
Local Authorities made a small fortune when they privatized the Bin collection services. Please let us know what they did with the millions of euros that they received.
F F S
All used electrical appliances can be returned to electrical shops for free under the Wee scheme and are also taken in by County councils for free .
But some dump it and adds thousands of euro to the clean up bill .
Agreed with the idea to improve the garbage recollection system.
have your say