Police Abuse Of Privacy

This is a very interesting case, there are more questions from the article than answers but it is a case worthy of debate.

The first question I would ask is did the person releasing the information do it as an individual or was it sanctioned by the organisation ?

Was the information distributed with the knowledge and agreement of the organisation ?

Who sanctioned the release of the information !

If the organisation released the information then the question must be asked why and what authority was used. Its easy to say a person must be charged and convicted  prior to releasing information but what about a case where the police are looking for a suspect and consider them dangerous so go public in order to warn the public of the danger. The person may not be charged or convicted at a later stage ?

If the individual acted by themselves the question is why ?

If the organisation has a duty of care and procedures then the individual must and is ethically bound to follow these procedures. Taking an individual decision to breach such procedures is a breach of trust and against the rules of the organisation in my opnion.

Another question I would ask is how the individual accesed the information in question and used it. This seems to be a pure data protection issue. The data protection legislation has come into being to protect the rights of all individuals and to breach such rules, in my opnion is questionable. I say questionable because again we have a moral and ethical issue which is even recognised in law. There is legislation that cover people who expose organisation corruption, unethical working practices etc, even if by so doing so they have broken the basis procedures of the organisation or data protection laws. It is questionable in these circumstances that this could be the case but without all the facts who knows.

If a Police officer has a duty of care then there is a balance with regards to that duty of care. The question I would ask is if the individual carried out the actions without the sanction of the organisation why ?

Perhaps other members may wish to share their views and add to this debate !