Privacy Commissioner's Review of the Privacy Act

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Privacy Commissioner's Review of the Privacy Act

Reports

Section 26 of the Privacy Act required the Privacy Commissioner to review the operation of the Act as soon practicable after it had been in force for three years. This review was completed in November 1998 and resulted in a 420 page report Necessary and Desirable: Privacy Act 1993 Review (generally referred to as Necessary and Desirable). This contained 154 recommendations for amendment or further study.

Section 26 also requires further periodic reviews. The Commissioner has submitted several short supplementary reports noting developments that might affect the recommendations. These reports included a number of supplementary recommendations.

Necessary and Desirable made some recommendations in relation to information matching but anticipated that a further specialised review of the information matching rules would be needed. The Commissioner undertook a supplementary review and submitted a further report in June 2001.

It is expected that some of the Commissioner’s recommendations will be addressed in an amendment bill that may be introduced to Parliament during 2008.

To download documents please click the following links:

· Necessary and Desirable – highlights document (PDF file 42 pages 3.61MB)

. Necessary and Desirable – the 1998 report (Warning: large document, PDF file 434 pages, 2.44MB)

. Necessary and Desirable – the 1998 report in separate chapters (Content, Preface, Introduction, Background, Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V, Part VI, Part VII, Part VIII, Part IX, Part X, Part XI, Part XII, Schedules, Summary of Recommendations, Appd A, Appd B, Appd C, Appd D, Appd E, Appd F, Appd G, Appd H, Appd I, Appd J)

· The Commissioner’s supplementary reports from April 2000, January 2003, December 2003 and May 2008 (Media release report)

· Consolidated list of Recommendations from the 1998 and supplementary reports

· 2001 and 2003 report recommending amendments to the information matching rules

Printed copies of Necessary and Desirable can be purchased from the Office of the Privacy Commissioner (enquiries@privacy.org.nz) for $40.00, for as long as stocks last.

Other material on the 1998 review

The 1998 review involved a series of stages of research, consultation and analysis. In the public phase of the review, the Office of the Privacy Commissioner released 12 discussion papers:

· DP1 Structure and Scope

· DP 2 Information Privacy Principles

· DP 3 Access and Correction

· DP 4 Codes of Practice and Exemptions

· DP 5 Public Register Privacy Issues

· DP 6 Complaints and Investigation

· DP 7 Information Matching

· DP 8 Law Enforcement Information

· DP 9 Compliance and Administration Costs

· DP 10 Interaction with other Laws

· DP 11 Intelligence Organisations

· DP 12 New Privacy Protections

Four volumes of submissions; volume 1 (DP1, DP2, DP3, DP4, DP5), volume 2 (DP6, DP7, DP8, DP9, DP10, DP11, DP 12), volume 3 (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3) and volume 4 (Part 1, Part 2) were received. The Office of the Privacy Commissioner compiled complete sets of all the submissions and some specialist compilations in particular areas (such as complaints, compliance costs, public registers and intelligence organisations). Photocopies of these compilations are available for purchase for $12.50 from the Office of the Privacy Commissioner (enquiries@privacy.org.nz).