The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has published a guide to data protection for small businesses, in a bid to make compliance easier and to warn companies of the ongoing scam involving bogus government agencies.
The guide, Getting it Right, aims to give businesses a jargon-free explanation of what they need to know to comply with the Data Protection Act (DPA) and is available online.
It also warns companies to beware of bogus data protection ‘agencies’ run by fraudsters who demand high fees to register companies under the DPA. The ICO said letters from agencies charging more than £35 for notification are likely to be a scam.
The ICO was unable to give figures for the number of businesses that had sent in notifications because many had sent theirs to fraudsters.
Personnel Today exposed the data protection scam last year, prompting Information Commissioner Richard Thomas to write a best practice guide for readers.
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weblinks www.information commissioner.gov.uk
www.personneltoday.com/goto/24178
