Remote working and Data Protection and Freedom of Information

In the current exceptional circumstances, we would like to highlight to colleagues that information relating to University business is still subject to the Data Protection Act (DPA) and the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), regardless of the format in which it is recorded, including in personal email accounts or on personal devices.

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) states that information held in non-work personal email accounts (for example, Hotmail, Yahoo and Gmail), recorded on mobile devices, including text messages and Whatsapp chats, or in any other media format, may be subject to information governance legislation if it is held by someone who has a direct, formal connection with the University and relates to University official business.

In relation to online meetings, whilst Zoom is currently configured so that no recording takes place by the Zoom application and the chat facility is not retained by Zoom post meeting, any transcript downloaded to personal devices would be subject to FOIA and DPA as outlined above.  You should therefore not download a transcript of online meetings; the official record of a meeting should always be stored on the appropriate University record-keeping system.

We advise staff to maintain the same levels of professionalism and follow the usual University policies as they would in the office, and to choose an appropriate medium for communicating work-related matters, using University systems wherever possible.

We recognise that, in the current circumstances, everyone will be using a range of methods to keep in touch in a social sense; please take care to do this separately from business matters.

For further information, please refer to official information held in private email accounts.

If you have any queries, please contact the University’s Data Protection Officer or Freedom of Information Officer.