Comment by mgbmtl | Hacker News Reader

Comment by mgbmtl | Hacker News Reader

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> We are supposed to employ a 'data officer' this basically cannot be anyone who works in the school at present.

Naive question: isn't the data officer basically a single point of contact on data issues (and have some general knowledge on the topic)? Why can it not be someone working at the school?

By default, if they cannot delegate, wouldn't the responsibility go to the director of the school?

I feel like we tend to be overly pedantic in how we interpret some of the GDPR. For example, a small shop might not have a physical security officer. The owner/manager of the shop still has to have some general sense about ensuring the physical security of the shop, dealing with contractors/vendors (alarm system), etc.

With data collection, isn't it the same? Aren't people already doing this? No one would collect data, and not care about its basic security?

I think it's great that GDPR is forcing people to wonder: what data do we have, is it shared, who is responsible, what's the retention, and can it be deleted on request. After that, I don't buy into the fear mongers trying to make a quick buck.

A small shop absolutely does not need a DPO. See guidance here: http://gdprandyou.ie/data-protection-officer/

If the small shop happens to be collecting sensitive personal data -- health data, political affiliations or union membership, etc. -- (a) they should probably stop and (b) they would need a DPO.

Highly unlikely in any case !

As to the DPO, it is meant to be an independent person within the organisation, who cannot be unduly influenced by management, etc. Assigning the role to a regular employee who, e.g., reports to the principal and is a teacher by day, would not seem to satisfy the requirement.

Bear in mind that a DPO has to have "expert knowledge of data protection law and practices and the ability to fulfil the tasks referred to in Article 39".

The link you provided says you need a DPO in an organization

> Where the core activities of the organisation (controller or processor) consist of data processing operations, which require regular and systematic monitoring of individuals on a large scale

Small shops contain things that they sell, and they also keep records of selling things for tax purposes, and may even have video cameras to avoid getting robbed. IANAL but isn't that a lot of data processing operations, and isn't there lots of systematic monitoring of individuals?

Or are you saying that because it's not "large scale" (e.g. only 100 people walk in a day) and it doesn't have sensitive data, then it's immune?

A DPO is only mandatory if the core activities of your business include regular and systematic monitoring of individuals on a large scale, or include the processing on a large scale of specially protected information.

A shop only processes personal data as a secondary activity, with their core activity being selling merchandise. The data they do process is not in a specially protected category under the GDPR and pertains only to their business rather than the wider lives of their customers. They do not need a designated DPO.

A social media network, an ad tech company or a credit reference agency does need a DPO. A manufacturer of IoT gadgets that constantly phone home with a stream of usage data almost certainly needs a DPO. If the IoT gadget I sold you tells me what time you get home from work and what time you go to bed, that sounds an awful lot like "regular and systematic monitoring". A manufacturer of IoT gadgets that only phone home occasionally with fully anonymised error logs probably doesn't need a DPO.

This sounds pretty reasonable - I misjudged how bad the DPO requirement was. Thanks for explaining it to me!

Keeping things for tax purposes requires no consent, same for anything you are legally required to keep record off. Video cameras most certainly fall under legitimate interest (as long as you follow the law about using surveillance in your country).

From what I recall on the info I've seen locally is that you don't need a DPO until you hit 250 employees.

The core activities of a small shop do not consist of data processing operations which require monitoring people.

The core activities of a small shop include some data processing operations that don't require monitoring people (e.g. records of what they sell), and an anti-robbery video camera isn't a core activity of their business; I'd even assume that it's not looked at most of the time and is even more likely to be outsourced to some security company (which would have a DPO).

>No one would collect data, and not care about its basic security?

Um...

I think that's exactly what most small organizations do.

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