THE NATIONAL ARCHIVES’ DATA PROTECTION POLICY STATEMENT.pdf

THE NATIONAL ARCHIVES’ DATA PROTECTION POLICY STATEMENT 1 The scope of this policy statement 1.1 This policy statement sets out how The National Archives implements the Data Protection Act 1998. This Act was brought into force on 1 March 2000, entirely replacing the 1984 Act. Its scope was extended by the Freedom of Information Act 2000. 1.2 The National Archives collects and uses information about the people with whom we deal. We also acquire information about others in the course of those dealings. These people – collectively called ‘data subjects’ - include our own staff, researchers and other users of our services, staff in other government departments and in a wide range of organisations and institutions, as well as contractors and suppliers of various kinds. The information can be factual information, such as name and address, or expressions of opinion about or intentions towards individuals. It can occur in any form or format - WORD documents, databases and spreadsheets, emails, CCTV, index cards, paper files. We also acquire responsibility for personal information in our archival holdings which, in some circumstances, are subject to parts of the Data Protection Act (see section 4). 1.3 This policy statement applies to all personal data acquired, held and used by all constituent parts of The National Archives, as does the companion document, our Data Protection Procedures. Note that this includes personal data for which the Controller of HMSO is responsible. 2 Background 2.1 The 1998 Data Protection Act (DPA) came into force on 1 March 2000. It supersedes and extends the provisions of the Data Protection Act 1984. The new Act implements a European Directive of 1995