Guardian CiF: Data sharing in Whitehall must be limited ...

Andrew Watson · **Posted:** Wed, 25 Apr 2012 09:56:33 +0000

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... CMP=twt_fd

Data sharing in Whitehall must be limited by respect for private rights

The government should establish clear guidelines on people's rights to privacy to put a brake on official bodies sharing data

* Guy Herbert
* guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 24 April 2012 12.22 BST

...

Actually there is no lack of clarity about what the law permits. What there is, is a conflict between the inherent desire of bureaucracy to collect and use ever more information about citizens, and the fundamental rule of a free society – that officials cannot just make up powers to suit themselves. "The government are proposing to drive a coach and horses through the duty of confidentiality that the state owes to individuals in any case where a quite nebulous concept of public good decides to trump the private right," as Dominic Grieve, now attorney general, put it when he answered Straw.

The problem for officialdom is that both private right and public law stand in the way of data sharing as the standard solution to every problem of administration. The four "barriers" to information sharing that every mandarin can repeat in his sleep are: (1) data protection; (2) human rights; (3) common law confidentiality; (4) ultra vires. Inconvenient they may be. They are supposed to be. They are foundations of the rule of law. That they are crumbling is no reason to smash them.

...

David Moss · **Joined:** Sat, 07 Apr 2007 10:29:05 +0000 **Posts:** 2842

Quote:

The problem for officialdom is that both private right and public law stand in the way of data sharing as the standard solution to every problem of administration. The four "barriers" to information sharing that every mandarin can repeat in his sleep are: (1) data protection; (2) human rights; (3) common law confidentiality; (4) ultra vires. Inconvenient they may be. They are supposed to be. They are foundations of the rule of law. That they are crumbling is no reason to smash them.

Her Majesty's government's plans for a G-Cloud -- to the extent that they are known and comprehensible -- would see all centrally held data stored in a government cloud and shared between the departments of state. They would see the crumbling foundations thereby smashed. HMG are now hosting a debate on G-Cloud. The invitation to contribute appeared on their blog yesterday afternoon at about 4 o'clock. RSVP to http://gcloud.civilservice.gov.uk/2012/04/27/crowdsourcing-and-a-response/.

Guest · **Posted:** Sat, 28 Apr 2012 23:05:11 +0000

David Moss wrote:

... The invitation to contribute appeared on their blog yesterday afternoon at about 4 o'clock. ...

You definitely hit a nerve with Question 4! The one about jurisdiction and foreign government (particularly the US) access to it.
Also very interesting is the choice of wording of the 'discussion points' raised.

David Moss · **Joined:** Sat, 07 Apr 2007 10:29:05 +0000 **Posts:** 2842

Quote:

You definitely hit a nerve with Question 4! The one about jurisdiction and foreign government (particularly the US) access to it.
Also very interesting is the choice of wording of the 'discussion points' raised.

I admire your choice of the word "interesting" to describe the way HMG have re-worded the original question and assure you that I recognise the effort of self-restraint required. Let's see what "crowd-thoughts" are published.

MrBester · **Posted:** Mon, 30 Apr 2012 12:19:47 +0000

(Question 3)
"There is a lot of mis-information about security. Let’s unpick this."
And then proceed to do exactly the opposite by focusing on the irrelevant (DDoS of HO site) and loftily waving away the RSA issue with an albeit true but pointless short sentence.

David Moss · **Joined:** Sat, 07 Apr 2007 10:29:05 +0000 **Posts:** 2842

MrBester wrote:

... loftily waving away the RSA issue ...

Quite.

It's not clear that Eleanor Stewart knows who Rivest, Shamir and Adleman are and thus the import of RSA themselves being hacked.

David Moss · **Joined:** Sat, 07 Apr 2007 10:29:05 +0000 **Posts:** 2842

Please note with respect to the http://gcloud.civilservice.gov.uk blog:

1. Comments are moderated before publication. The moderation process can take hours or days.

2. Comments may sometimes be edited before being published.

3. Not all comments are necessarily published.

4. When they are published, they are date-stamped with the date of submission.

5. Comments may be canvassed from interested parties.

At the moment (1 May 2012 13:34), there is only one published comment -- the limiting case of a crowd.

NO2ID

Guardian CiF: Data sharing in Whitehall must be limited ...

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