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Reading between the lines the mistake here seems to have been due to data retention processes which were "overzealous". If you have an encounter with the police
by seanhunter 6y ago
Reading between the lines the mistake here seems to have been due to data retention processes which were "overzealous". If you have an encounter with the police and they store your details, but you are never charged with any sort of crime, they are required to delete your details after a certain time has elapsed. The process to prune these details is legally required to remove the data from backups also because the police don't have the right to keep your details on their systems any more.
However it seems somehow additional records were subject to the purge which should not have been.
- seanhunter 6y agoAs an aside, this specific problem seems like something there could be a strong cryptographic solution to. eg rather than just deleting records, they could encrypt them first with a public key where the private half is owned by a third party such as the information commissioner (https://ico.org.uk/ https://ico.org.uk/) and then archive them. If at a later date they find they need them back they request a decryption and give their reasons. If the ICO thinks the reasons are valid (ie the police have the right to have the data and therefore should not have deleted it), then they decrypt, but otherwise the police don't have access to the data. Usage of the private key could be subject to an audited break glass procedure to prevent abuse.