back to article Happy Data Protection Day

Today is a special day. No, not iPad day - it's the fourth European Data Protection Day. The European Data Protection Supervisor is trying to show the importance of privacy and data protection. The right to privacy and protection of personal data are recognised as separate and fundamental rights in the EU Charter, backed by …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    The data is so private

    none of us knew - why can i sense tax payers money being wasted here???

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Coffee/keyboard

    ha ha ha ha ha

    This is April fools right? The ICO is trying to teach people about privacy...... No wait, You owe me a new keyboard.

    PHORM. Nuff said.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Unhappy

    Will someone please tell the UK government?

    Will someone please tell the UK government?

  4. Scho
    Joke

    Damn...

    I forgot to bring my Happy Data Protection Day card into work for my work chums....

  5. grimreality
    Linux

    A tad bit ripe from the gov't

    Keep your data private and be careful about giving out too much on social networking sites.

    This from a gov't who has a business plan that involves forcing us to give over information that they then sell on to anyone willing to pay.

  6. silver fox
    Unhappy

    Employer monitoring emails

    So... should I send a card to my employer, who routinely monitors and reads emails, whether business or personal? They see it as a source of information about employees.

    Or should i just get an iphone and email through that?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      there is a very good chance

      That before you were given email/internet access by your employer, you were explicitly told/had to sign to say that you would only use it for work.

      You are probably forbidden to use it for anything personal, so it's not a huge stretch for them to claim that they are OK monitoring them.

  7. Qwelak
    Happy

    Of course I din't know

    The data was protected wasn't it.

    PGB

  8. The BigYin

    Privacy?

    What are you trying to hide, citizen?

  9. Fluffykins Silver badge

    Maybe someone should mention Phorm

    Ther, I've done it

    parasites

  10. Dougle
    Thumb Up

    HAPPY DATA PROTECTION DAY

    I wonder how many government laptops will be lost/stolen today

  11. Neil Shepherd
    Coat

    Sorry, I Have To...

    They certainly didn't let that particular bit of info. leak did they? =:D

    Now if this had been a UK government minister with a memory stick...

  12. The Cube
    Grenade

    Airstrike

    Will the Euro Commissioner be calling an airstrike on Downing Street as part of showing the importance of data protection and privacy.

    Perhaps they could rid us of DVLA and the Idiot Passport "Service", the Police's illegal DNA database as part of a co-ordinated celebration the list goes on.

    They could call it the war on data then the Americans would want to join in too...

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Over in the netherlands...

    ... there was a tiny little spat, fully ignored by any news gig not IT related, that the national public transport card (``oyster card'' reinvented) was blatantly infringing privacy for no better reason than entirely avoidable bad system design. When asked about it several politicians went in full ``But I didn't know that!!!one!'' mode.

    Yeah, sure. Same problem with the nation wide (``london congestion charge'' like) system intended to do road taxes. And there's the national electronic medical filing system, and the national electronic children filing system, oh and the national fingerprinting database that is now already mandatory for getting a new passport or ID card, complete with RFID chips that incidentally very recently have been further scientifically compromised. Of course none of the politicians took note.

    And neither did the media.

    The UK is close to unfit for living in for mere mortals, but it certainly isn't the only one doing its damnedest to screw over its citizens. Whether in the name of cost efficiency, taxes or terrorism, it's all the same to me. Clearly, privacy and data protection are dead letters and have been for some time. Thus making this a day for mourning.

  14. Anonymous Coward
    Big Brother

    Wrong target

    "...the Information Commissioner's Office is supporting the initiative with activities to teach children, and their teachers, about the importance of privacy"

    They might be better off taking on the more ambitious target of teaching business, the government, local authorities, the police and Labour think tanks the ins and outs of these interesting concepts.

  15. /\/\j17

    Does the ICO do irony?

    "...the Information Commissioner's Office is supporting the initiative with activities to teach children, and their teachers, about the importance of privacy"

    Go on. Combine it with a stall where the children can sign-up for ID cards to give away all their privacy!

  16. TeeCee Gold badge
    FAIL

    *We* didn't know?

    Never mind that, the bloody government obviously doesn't know.

    Where's the unctuous PR from the Home Office celebrating Data Protection Day and taking the oppportunity to remind us of the sterling work they're doing with ID cards to "protect our data"?

    Lazy, good for nothing bastards ruining a perfectly good slagging off opportunity round here....

  17. markp 1
    Boffin

    my irony lobe damn near exploded there

    ... hearing of this landmark being overshadowed by the personal data trainwreck that is the iTampon :/

  18. Dann
    Megaphone

    sys admin day?

    Still not as cool as sys admin day!

    www.sysadminday.co.uk

    No one knows that exists either!

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