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UK: Major problems with government's approach to data security

14 September 2016

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"The UK government has been urged to adopt a "new approach" to data security by the National Audit Office (NAO).

The spending watchdog found that "too many bodies" within government have "overlapping responsibilities" for information security matters and that insufficiently clear information is collected by the government on the way it performs in protecting data or the costs involved...

The way in which personal data breaches are reported by government departments was also described by the NAO as "chaotic". It said different departments operate different reporting mechanisms which render comparisons between the organisations as "meaningless".

According to the report, there were 8,995 data breaches recorded by the 17 largest government departments in 2014/15. Of that number, 14 incidents were reported to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO)."

See: UK government urged to adopt 'new approach' to data security (Out-Law.com, link) and the report: National Audit Office: Protecting information across government (pdf)

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