DVLA Found To Mishandle Confidential Driver Information
Friday, 10. May 2019
Following a BBC Freedom Of Information request it was found that the DVLA had mishandled the personal data of 2,000 drivers over the last 12 months. During a ten-month period in 2018 and 2019, the DVLA reported 439 data breaches, which affected 2,018 people.
These data breaches saw the DVLA send important documents – including driving licenses, passports and marriage certificates – to incorrect addresses, affecting the equivalent of around seven people per day. For comparison, the Passport Office had five data breaches over the same time period, while HM Revenue & Customs had 10.
All of the breaches were reported to the Information Commissioner’s Office, between 25 May 2018 and 18 March 2019, following the introduction of tougher data protection laws. Royal Mail advised that important or sensitive documents should be sent via a tracked special delivery. The DVLA said the data breaches were the result of “human error” by staff at their headquarters in Swansea.
A DVLA spokesperson said: “Last year, we dealt with more than one billion customer interactions. We received more than 16 million items of mail and sent out more than 93 million, including 10.6 million driving licences.
“However, we take our duties to protect data extremely seriously and have an open and transparent culture where staff report any potential breaches.
“We ensure we review all reports to identify what more can be done. While these figures are a very small percentage of our overall transaction volumes, we take these seriously and have apologised to those concerned.”
Whilst one could argue that in the scale of things 2,000 is a very small number, that’s fine unless you are one of the 2,000 affected. Not one piece of data should go astray so sort your systems out DVLA. By Graham Hill with thanks to Auto Express.
