Somewhat belatedly, I note that last week was Stupid Aid Week, which aimed to highlight "common misunderstandings such as the belief by some organisations that data protection stops them giving out any personal information or prevents them from dealing with certain types of enquiries."
The Information Commissioner used it to highlight his reprimand of Marks and Spencers, who told a mother that they could not answer her query about an order of a Superman suit for her son, because to do so would infringe his data protection rights.
This seemed timely to me as I was delivering data protection training at work today, and it's surprising how many people believe that the Data Protection Act really does prevent organisations from doing common-sense things.
The Information Commissioner used it to highlight his reprimand of Marks and Spencers, who told a mother that they could not answer her query about an order of a Superman suit for her son, because to do so would infringe his data protection rights.
This seemed timely to me as I was delivering data protection training at work today, and it's surprising how many people believe that the Data Protection Act really does prevent organisations from doing common-sense things.