152
Investigatory Powers Commissioner’s Annual Report 2019
Error Investigation 2
Public Authority
Human or Technical:
Human (Applicant)
Classification:
Transposition
Data Acquired:
Subscriber information relating to an email address and recent
IP logon history.
Description:
A police authority was trying to locate an individual because of concerns
for their welfare. An officer identified the individual’s email address.
They sought, via the SPoC, to resolve when and where the person had
last used their email account. The officer was unable to cut and paste
the email address into the incident log and so manually transposed it.
When doing so, they mistyped the email address.
A request was made on an incorrect email address and the provider
returned details of the account’s most recent activity. Officers were
deployed to locate the user of that account to check on their welfare.
Once they realised their mistake, the officers replicated the search on
the correct account and found it to be inactive.
Consequence:
Police visited the premise of an individual unconnected to their search.
There was no determination by the IPC, as the effect on those visited
was assessed not to have caused significant prejudice or harm.
Error Investigation 3
Public Authority
Human or Technical:
Human
Classification:
Transposition
Data Acquired:
Subscriber information relating to a telephone number.
Description:
A police force was trying to locate an individual due to concern for their
welfare. The authority had previously conducted checks on the individual
for similar reasons. The authority’s records included a contact number
for the individual.
The authority submitted checks to confirm the subscriber to the number
and visited the address listed on the account. Its owner, who was able to
produce the phone, clearly had no connection to this enquiry. A check of
the previous record ascertained the recorded number had been entered
into the system incorrectly.
Once this had been rectified, the authority was able to locate the
individual, who was found to be safe and well.
Consequence:
Police visited the premise of an individual unconnected to their search.
There was no determination by the IPC, as the effect on those visited
was assessed not to have caused significant prejudice or harm.