A report published by the UK Information Commissioner’s Office today found that police forces are routinely processing ‘potentially excessive’ sensitive personal data belonging to members of the public from mobile phones in the course of criminal investigations.
The Centre for Women’s Justice (CWJ) – which is representing victims of serious sexual offences in a judicial review claim against the National Police Chiefs’ Council and the Crown Prosecution Service in respect of their policy on digital data downloads – now calls on the NPCC to immediately withdraw consent forms given to victims and remedy their practice, which has led to grave injustices for victims of rape and sexual assault.
The claim, on behalf of two victims of serious sexual offences, set out how consent forms routinely issued to victims were unlawful, in policy and practice, and discriminated against women. Both claimants had been told that no criminal action could be taken against their attackers unless they agreed to full downloads of data from their mobile phones spanning a number of years. Their experience is echoed by hundreds of rape and sexual assault complainants, many of whom have contacted CWJ for advice about the ongoing practice. The case was put on hold to await the ICO report.
The Commissioner’s 18-month investigation, which reviewed a number of different police forces’ procedures for extraction of mobile phone data, also found ‘no evidence’ of police officers considering less intrusive alternatives to mobile phone extraction, and expressed concern that: ‘Considerations of necessity, proportionality and collateral intrusion were not, based on what we saw, sufficiently or routinely documented’.
CWJ’s judicial review claim cited the same concerns and additionally highlighted how the operation of this policy in relation to rape and sexual assault discriminated against women. Evidence recently obtained by Big Brother Watch via a Freedom of Information request [link their press release with data] strongly confirms how the use of the policy in rape investigations discriminates against women.
CWJ believes that the experience of these victims is, worryingly, now the norm in sexual offences investigations, causing many complainants to feel pressured into waiving their privacy rights, or simply dropping out of the criminal justice process altogether.
Kate Ellis, solicitor at CWJ said:
“At CWJ we are constantly being referred cases where victims of serious sexual offending are extremely distressed that they have been asked to agree to a full or very extensive download from their mobile phones, whether or not it’s proportionate to the facts of the case. Victims are frequently being told that they have no choice, or the suspect will not be prosecuted.”
Big Brother Watch’s recent Freedom of Information request has also revealed that, in circumstances where rape victims refuse requests for their digital data, suspects are routinely being released without charge.
Harriet Wistrich, Director of CWJ, stated:
“The ICO report confirms what women’s sector organisations and others have been saying, that the approach to digital downloads is unlawful. We call on all criminal justice agencies to put an immediate stop to disproportionate data requests and to properly and immediately consult with victim organisations in order to remedy a state of affairs which denies justice to victims.”
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