The personal details of 20,000 Hong Kong residents who made complaints against the police were recently discovered freely available on the Internet. According to experts at InfoWatch, it is unlikely anyone will be complaining about the police in the near future because there are guarantees of confidentiality.
The personal data of 20,000 people who filed complaints against the Hong Kong police were recently found to be freely available on the Internet. The leak of private information from the Independent Police Complaints Council (IPCC) has caused quite a stir on the Chinese island.
All the records were leaked from a huge database that contained the addresses, names, ages, gender, ID numbers and a series of other data columns on around 20,000 people in Hong Kong who filed complaints with the IPCC from 1996 to 2004. The leak was discovered by a reporter from the independent webb-site.com, which provides constant coverage of corporate and government events in Hong Kong.
By all accounts, it appears that the leak was the result of a police contractor copying the database on to a commercial server. The format in which the private details appeared on the Internet attests to that theory, although no official statement has been made to that effect.
The leak has led to consumer rights organizations carrying out independent assessments of the level of security state agencies provide for personal data. Local laws also allow those affected to demand compensation from the data operators, even if the damage caused is only emotional. In other words, the case could well go beyond the front pages of the local newspapers to the courtroom. In that case the IPCC will have to prove that personal details are now secure and accept responsibility for the leak that has already taken place.
“I would also add that the image of the IPCC has been hit hard. It is particularly important for that organization to be trusted by those who have suffered from police actions. However, after an incident like that there aren’t going to be many people who want to complain about the law enforcement agencies. The police could well find out about it and make life more difficult for the person," says Denis Zenkin, marketing director at InfoWatch.
Source: webb-site.com
