A Historical Society (the ICO haven’t released the name of which one) has been fined after a laptop was stolen,  holding sensitive personal data on those who had donated or loaned artefacts. The laptop was unencrypted and the ICO found that there were no policies in place when it came to encryption or homeworking. The organisation was fined just £500 to be reduced to £400 if paid early.  Not much of a punishment if you ask me – who doesn’t encrypt sensitive personal data now-a-days??

This announcement was released less than a week after Essex, Suffolk and Norfolk had fallen into a debacle where thousands of highly sensitive medical records were lost in transit between GP surgeries. It seems extraordinary that, even in this age of drones and virtual reality, doctors’ surgeries are still using hard copy of our medical records which, if you change practices,  have to be physically picked up from your old doctor’s surgery and transferred to your new GP.

Just imagine moving house – it’s very exciting, and stressful and can be overwhelming. Whether you are just moving down the road or across counties, you have the worry of unpacking, making your new house a home, changing your address on things like your driver’s license, bank account etc. You also have to think about changing your dentist and of course your doctor.

Capita, an outsourced company, took on the national £400 million, 7 year NHS contract in September last year to do a number of things, including transferring patient notes from one GP practice to another. It has just been reported that over 9,000 patient records have gone missing in the last couple of months across East Anglia alone. The GPC (the General Practitioners Committee) ran a survey of 281 practices and found that just under a third had received the wrong patient notes, over a quarter of practices failed to have records collected from them on the agreed date with Capita and over 80% of urgent requests for records were not processed within 3 weeks.

The NHS is always under scrutiny for something but when they don’t have the correct information for their patients, it makes you feel a little sorry for them.

The main question on my mind is why are there still physical records for such sensitive information like your medical history? The target to reach the utopia of paperless patient records is currently 2020, so for another 4 years our physical records will still need to be transferred physically if we move to another practice. Given the ransomware attacks, breaches and hacks already prevalent within not only the NHS but across all organisations and business sectors, you have to hope that greater care will be taken with our digital records than we are currently seeing with our physical records.

What I find interesting is that Capita, according to a report from the BBC, has refused to recognise these claims. If that is the case, you have to ask why, only last week, Health minister Nicola Blackwood told MPs that she expects Capita to consider “compensation as an option” and stated that Capita had been ‘inadequately prepared’ to take over the primary care support services contract earlier this year. She also made it plain that there should have been greater scrutiny of Capita’s competence in delivering the contract.

A Capita spokeswoman said: ‘NHS England contracted Capita to both streamline delivery of GP support services and make significant cost savings across what was a highly localised service with unstandardised, generally unmeasured and in some cases, uncompliant processes.

We have taken on this challenging initiative and we have openly apologised for the varied level of service experienced by some service users as these services were transitioned and are being transformed.’ She said the company did not recognise ‘whatsoever’ claims that thousands of patient records were missing.

Regardless of the above, what is absolutely clear is that whether you are transferring data either physically, like in this case, or electronically it is highly important to have appropriate security procedures in place. Keep records of the data you are transferring. Know that it has – or has not arrived. And, if you’re using digital transfers, the ICO has recommended encrypting not only your files but also the connection you are using to transfer them.

Now if you excuse me I’m just off to call my doctor’s surgery and see if they still are in possession of my medical notes!

Written by Charlotte Seymour – November 2016

Charities are having a tough time with data protection at the moment.  The Daily Mail is pursuing them for their donor practices, and even when their behaviour is compliant, the reputational impact is enormously damaging to all charities, not just the few cited in the press.

Now the Altzheimer’s Society has fallen foul of the ICO because its volunteers were not trained in data protection, and were following inadequate processes, particularly in relation to sensitive personal data – for example using personal email addresses for sharing and receiving data about users of the charity;  storing unencrypted data on their home computers;  and not keeping paper records locked away securely.

This case does illustrate the need for charities to provide data protection training, not only among its own employees, but also to its volunteers.  Volunteers give selflessly of their time and energy, but even with the best intentions in the world, they cannot be expected to know the nuances of what is and is not acceptable in terms of data compliance and security.  Where sensitive personal data is concerned, this becomes a significant failing that will rebound on the charity  and generate a great deal of negative attention.  At the same time, lack of procedure and training creates an enormous risk of potential damage and distress to the very vulnerable individuals the charity is seeking to help.

Training volunteers as well as staff in data protection is essential to ensure security is maintained, that users are protected, and to provide reassurance that the charity is adopting a robust approach to data protection – particularly important to the Trustees as they are accountable and liable for breaches.

In addition, the charity’s own policies and procedures should be distributed and explained to all volunteers without exception.  And finally, checks should be carried out on an ongoing basis to ensure that volunteers are adhering to the charity’s documented policies and procedures.

Data Compliant is pleased to offer face to face training, and / or  online data protection training  – in each case, covering the 8 principles of the Data Protection Act, Privacy and Electronic Communication Regulation, data security and information on the upcoming European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

Data Compliant training courses are written in clear, easy language.  The online training includes relevant and engaging gamification, and is ideal for employees, volunteers and Trustees.  If you’d like more information, please email dc@datacompliant.co.uk or call 01787 277742.

Victoria Tuffill, CEO Data Compliant