Since 1999, back in the mists of time, when I became Gartner's Privacy
Officer, I have preached the gospel of "Teach people how to recognise a DPA
request and to handle it by passing it at once to an expert."
We implemented it then with a voice-mailbox that did not take messages but
repeated twice the instructions for an individual with a query, and a
standing instruction to the switchboard to put all relevant calls through to
that number. We implemented a simple email: "privacy@" and we implemented a
mailbox in the post room labelled "privacy" where all requests could be
sent, including those from members of the public.
I think the public sector is somewhat ahead of the private sector in doing
this type of thing. I suspect this is because an officer of a public body
is genuinely more accountable than a staff member of a corporation.
The whole thing is the culture of (I was going to say "privacy" but FoI is
as important) accountability. It is important for those at the centre to
ensure that those at the coalface know (a) that this is not theirs to deal
with, (b) whose task it is to deal with it [team, not individual] and (c)
has a simple means of getting it there.
-----Original Message-----
From: This list is for those interested in Data Protection issues
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Ekin Caglar
Sent: 16 February 2006 09:59
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [data-protection] "Please may I speak to your Privacy Officer?"
After the BT hassle, we thought about starting a campaign to help all of us
with information requests: Any request for information under DPA or FOIA
could have some sort of an identifier, e.g. the message "FOI Request" on the
envelope/email subject/etc, and the staff trained to send anything with that
message straight to the Information Governance Manager or somebody in an
equivalent position.
No call centre I have ever been in touch with knew anything about DPA, and
it is even worse for FOI (as requests can come in to ANY member of staff).
Ekin
-----Original Message-----
From: This list is for those interested in Data Protection issues
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Tim Trent
Sent: 15 February 2006 16:56
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [data-protection] "Please may I speak to your Privacy Officer?"
Over the past couple of days I and a co-researcher have been sampling
FTSE100 corporations and the ability of their switchboards to handle a very
simple enquiry from a member of the public.
We asked: "Please may I speak to your Privacy Officer - the person who looks
after Data Protection?" At that point, though we were friendly, we watched
as we were put through to strange places in the organisations. One
organisation put us through to Profit Protection (the anti shoplifting
squad!).
While we will be featuring the report in a newsletter shortly I wanted to
share it with all of you first. I have placed it on our website at a
parlously long link, so I am using "tiny" to shorten it for ease of
downloading <http://tinyurl.com/a9c3d> http://tinyurl.com/a9c3d It's about
a 200KB pdf file
As is our usual practice the report is free of charge in the membership area
of our site. You will be asked to enter your email address, and to register
if you are not already a member. As you would expect you are also free to
unsubscribe at any time.
I hope you find it useful. If you pass it on, please pass the link rather
than the document. But that is up to you entirely.
Tim Trent - Consultant
Direct: +44(0)1344 392644 Mobile:+44(0)7710 126618
email: [log in to unmask]
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