MI5 slammed over “undoubtedly unlawful” data practices
THE UK SECURITY service MI5 unlawfully acquired and stored data for years, according to the body responsible for overseeing the service’s work.
In evidence revealed during a court case challenging the validity of the Investigatory Powers Act (IPA), which allows security services to monitor hardware and communications, MI5 was forced to reveal practices that shocked the Investigatory Powers Commissioner’s Office (IPCO).
According to rights group Liberty, which brought the case, court documents show that MI5 had kept data to which it had no right, stored it in insecure places and misled officials to try and cover up its breaches.
“These shocking revelations expose how MI5 has been illegally mishandling our data for years, storing it when they have no legal basis to do so,” said Megan Goulding, a lawyer with Liberty. “It is unacceptable that the public is only learning now about these serious breaches after the government has been forced into revealing them in the course of a legal challenge.”
Liberty claims that MI5 officials attempted to hide the mistakes by providing misinformation to the IPCO and that they were continuing to obfuscate by applying to limit details of further breaches to secret evidence and private hearings.
“Despite a light being shone on this deplorable violation of our rights, the government is still trying to keep us in the dark over further examples of MI5 seriously breaching the law,” said Goulding.
According to the IPCO, MI5’s actions were “undoubtedly unlawful” with data being stored in “ungoverned spaces” with a “high likelihood of material being discovered when it should have been deleted”.