No basis to decline Dotcom’s request for information

KIM Dotcom’s request to see all personal information about him held by ministers, the Crown and Government agencies, which was originally refused, had ‘‘no proper basis’’ to be declined according to a Human Rights Review Tribunal decision.

The founder of Megaupload was awarded a declaration yesterday that his privacy was interfered with, and all agencies including the Crown and ministers had to comply with Mr Dotcom’s request for information, as well as pay damages of $90,000.

In July 2015, Mr Dotcom sent an information privacy request to all 28 ministers of the Crown and nearly every government agency. The 52 requests, in near identical terms, requested all personal information held about Kim Dotcom including information held under his previous names.

‘‘The requests advised that because the information was required for ‘pending legal action’, urgency was sought.’’

On August 5, 2015 the Solicitorgeneral provided a response on behalf of the Attorneygeneral in which the requests were declined on the stated ground that, in terms of the Privacy Act 1993 (PA), section 29 (1) (j) the requests were vexatious and included information which was trivial.

However, the Humans Rights Review Tribunal said ‘‘in this decision we explain our reasons for finding the transfers were not permitted by the Privacy Act and that in any event, there was no proper basis for the decline decision’’.

‘‘We are satisfied by [Mr Dotcom’s] evidence that the requests were genuine,’’ the tribunal said. — NZME