Legal Issues : The Data Protection Act 1998

Data Protection Act 1998, Freedom of Information Act 2000, Health and Social Care Act 2008, and Human Rights Act 1998

Data Protection Act 1998 – gives individuals the right to know what information is held about them, and those that processes personal information must comply with eight principles, which makes sure that personal information is fairly and lawfully processed; processed for limited purposes; adequate, relevant and not excessive; accurate and up to date; not kept for longer than is necessary; processed in line with your rights; secure; not transferred to other countries without adequate protection;

given extra safeguards for sensitive information – e.g. ethnicity, political views, religion, health or criminal records

The data protection act- the data protection act is legislation put in place to keep personal data confidential. It can promote anti-discriminatory practice as it can stop people finding out information about individuals that the individual wants to stay private. E.g. phone numbers and addresses. These would need to stay private so people don’t find out where you live or what is wrong with you.

The Data Protection Act 1998 is a piece of legislation which defines the law on processing data of people living within the United Kingdom.

Data protection is a very important piece of legislation that was brought into power in 1998, because it has been designed to prevent confidential and personal information being passed on to other people and any relevant companies without a person’s consent. This also means that any information that is stored of children should be kept in either a password protected or lockable location.

All operations within an organisation must be viable through legislation. Legislation often constrains just how much information an organisation can have and the manner in which it can be used. Legislation exists to protect both employee and employer from unfair conduct. Legislation is a law which has been produced by the government. Legislation exists to authorise access to particular files, to sanction individuals who do not abide by guidelines set, to restrict how much information can be given, etc. For example, employees must have a formally written contract of employment prior to commencing work with a company. It protects employees against unfair dismissal and states that a redundancy pay must be paid if the

covers correct storage and sharing of both manual and electronic information. There are eight principles put in place by the Data Protection Act 1998 to make sure that information is handled properly:

The Data Protection Act states that you must only collect information that you need for a specific purpose and keep it secure, ensure that it is relevant and up to date to guarantee that no changes in medication or health status goes unnoticed or unaccounted

Information Commissioner’s Office (2012) Introduction to The Data Protection Act 1998. [Online] Available from: http://www.ico.org.uk/~/media/documents/library/Corporate/Research_and_reports/ico_presentation_EVOC_20120528.ashx [Accessed: 11th October 2013]

* Processed in line with the rights of individuals - this includes the right to be informed of all the information held about them, to prevent processing of their personal information for marketing purposes, and to compensation if they can prove they have been damaged by a data controller's non-compliance with the Act.

This act applies to all organisations that process data relating to their staff and customers. It is the main legal framework in UK that protects personal data. The act contains 8 data protection principles which are:

a) Data protection Act (1998) – DPA ‘It is the main piece of legislation that governs the protection of personal data in the UK.’ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_Protection_Act_1998).

The Data Protection Act 1998 defines UK law on the processing of data on identifiable living people. The act contains eight principles, which all organisations processing personal information must conform to, these are:

The data protection act protects people who are identifiable from their information and data being shared. The information will be bank details, address and billing and some other personal details.