Harry’s Place

and Talk Sport (as well as Galloway) would be in breach of the Data Protection Act as well.

Bring him down!

How would this be any different if someone collected up all the emails he received at work from clients of his employer… and took them home to solicit orders for his on-the-side Amway business?

absolutely not in breach of the dpa… but on all other counts, guilty as a puppy sitting next to a pile of poo!

absolutely not in breach of the dpa: Why do you say that?

Yes, I wondered about that… nearly put in the DPA but wasn’t entirely sure: largely because the DPA’s definition of “personal data” is so nebulous and confusing.

Here’s the ICO’s guidance:

http://www.ico.gov.uk/upload/documents/determining_what_is_personal_data/whatispersonaldata2.htm

Depends if he warns emailers that their addys “may be passed to vetted third parties”.

Perhaps they aren’t being passed to third parties: but to Galloway himself who - as McKenzie points out - is RESPECT.

Hate GG as I do but has anyone here actually received a mail from him or is this just purely based on the article? I find it hard to believe that nobody here has sent GG a mail so why has this not come up before?

As a matter of interest, who does an email ‘belong’ to? Or does it depend on the contract? If you work for Company A and receive email on your work email relating to business (obviously not emails saying ‘please pick up some bread and milk on the way home’) do they belong to you or the company?

Presumably if you deal with clients or the public and leave the company, the company might reasonably want your successor to have access to previous correspondence, data and documents contained in emails sent to your account. I’m sure you couldn’t claim it was ‘yours’ so it must be ‘theirs’…

Use of personal (as opposed to business) email addresses for direct marketing purposes without the recipients prior consent will usually amount to a breach of the Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regualtions 2003 - with the same legal consequences of a breach of the DPA.

The Information Tribunal has held that promotion of a political party amounts to direct marketing for the purposes of the Regs / DPA.

I am pretty sure any emails containing the real names of the sender could qualify as personal data.

Also that the email is addressed to Galloway in his capacity as talk show host and that his using it for the purpose of recruiting would not have been agreed to by any vague opt in on the site.
I am constantly infuriated by phone centre personell refusing to discuss matters with me by parroting “Da’a protection” at me when clearly there are no Data Protection issues- but no matter how much and how forcefully I explain why it has nothing to do with DP even if it has to do with internal company beaurocracy, they of course never budge.

But in Galloway’s case, I am pretty sure there are potential Data Protection issues.
I like this from the IC’s guidance:
When considering identifiability it should be assumed that you are not looking just at the means reasonably likely to be used by the ordinary man in the street, but also the means that are likely to be used by a determined person with a particular reason to want to identify individuals. Examples would include investigative journalists, estranged partners, stalkers, or industrial spies.

A staff account, if that’s what he uses, ain’t personal. As LLH has just said, does electoral law apply?

Dance you Stalinist monkey, dance!

Hate GG as I do but has anyone here actually received a mail from him or is this just purely based on the article? I find it hard to believe that nobody here has sent GG a mail so why has this not come up before

I have! I wondered why I was suddenly getting e-mail’s from Respect when I have never been near their website or ever registered with them. I hate them. Why would I solicit e-mail from them?

Well, complain to the Information Commissioner.

Surely, unless users were offered an opt-out, they would be in breach of the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations 2003?

Rember George also used his Radio Show to promote a company called Miranda Media?
It organised a “convention” and he urged people to send cheques to his Parliamentary Office from where they would be “forwarded on” to “the people organising the convention”, Miranda Media Ltd

Well it seems George has come clean with the Register of Members Interests

Between the 22/1/08 and 5/2/08 George changed his vehicle for collecting his business interests

Register of Members Interests January 22nd

9. Registrable shareholdings
(a) Finjan Ltd, which receives my income as a journalist, author and public speaker.

5/2/08

9.Registrable shareholdings
(a) Miranda Media Ltd, which receives my income as a journalist, author and public speaker.

What did you email about, Maven?

Well, his Muslim friends aren’t going to be that interested in him anymore, now that he can’t distribute patronage on the scale he promised before the GLA elections, so he’s got to find a new constituency from somewhere.

Certainly explains how peoples phone numbers get passed around in the Respect/Miranda Media/Parliamentary Office.

Possibly Canada’s data protection law - Personal Information and Protection of Electronic Data Act (”PIPEDA” is different from the UK’s but over here, if you initiate contact or had dealings with the spam-sender, you’re fair game until such time as you put the spammer on notice that you don’t wish further contact, but there spam’s content has to be germain to the “existing relationship”. So, Galloway would only have the right to “collect, retain and use” if either the recipient had granted consent, and the consent was broad enough to allow him to contact them in any capacity, other than responding to a question about the opinions aired on the program.

Given some of the company Galloway keeps Talksport should have a look at this.
His long association with Jihadists at one end and the behaviour of the thug Ron McKay at the other.

As a matter of interest, who does an email ‘belong’ to? Or does it depend on the contract? If you work for Company A and receive email on your work email relating to business (obviously not emails saying ‘please pick up some bread and milk on the way home’) do they belong to you or the company?

Can’t say for sure, but in the States, I think it depends on who owns the computer on which you’re viewing the email. I think an employer has the legal right to track every single keystroke you make on a company computer as well as view anything you’re viewing on “their” computer. There is software available which allows them to do just that.

Excellent question, worthy of a separate post.

I emailed the Gorgeous One on Talksport and never got any spam. Either Georgie doesn’t want me for a sunbeam, or Kelvin Mackenzie is spouting shite. From a “former editor of The Sun”? Surely not!

For those who asked about my getting Respect e-mail; I will do something on Friday when I get to my home Outlook and retrieve the e-mail’s as evidence. I will then make a complaint to the Commissioner. If I might be permitted somehow to report back (maybe a few weeks) then I will keep you informed.

The only update I can give you is that I received nine e-mail’s from Respect (unsolicited) between 14th Nov 2007 and 4th March.

Here are the subjects:
‘March newspaper - please send us your letters, reviews and news!

‘Respect Burns Night fundraiser with George Galloway, 26 Jan

‘Respect Renewal Renewal newsletter

‘Salma Yaqoob on Radio 4 “Any Questions?” tonight

‘Respect Renewal News

‘Launch of new Respect newspaper

‘[Respect Renewal] Urgent: Protest against BNP leader in Oxford this Monday

‘Respect Renewal: Moving forward from Saturday’s fantastic conference

‘Respect Renewal Conference with George Galloway MP

So surprisingly he wasn’t after your bank account details to enable an international cash transfer.

So surprisingly he wasn’t after your bank account details to enable an international cash transfer

“Dear Friend,

Due to the unfortunate death of a friend from high office in Iraq I am left with some promissary notes amounting to millions of dollars which need to be paid into the bank accounts of someone not connected with my name since my friend had access to a number of accounts which we were able to use to facilitate the distribution of this money to various charities which we can no longer access. Millions of Palestinians are starving in concentration camps and thousands are dying ever day. Can you help us in this desperate plight?

This is where you can help. We would be able to transfer the money to an account in your name. No single amount would be less than $1m and as a commission we will grant you 20%. You would be helping millions of Palestinians escape from the Apartheid, Racist, Nazi regime and jackboot of Israel.

All we need are your bank details………………

(Spoof)