HSE informed commission of ‘breaches of security’ The Data Protection Commission (DPC) is investigating the HSE after online videos showed personal data contained in paper records being stored in external facilities. In a statement today the DPC said its inquiry ‘concerns the storage and retention of personal data contained in paper records held by the HSE via its use of external storage facilities, and breaches of security which were notified to the DPC by the HSE’. It added: “The breaches notified to the DPC related to two specific locations which were accessed by unauthorised third parties, and the circulation of videos taken from these locations showing paper medical records located at these facilities.
” It is believed that one of the incidents relates to a video posted on TikTok in November, which showed a person going through boxes of patient records in the now-vacant St Conal’s Psychiatric Hospital in Letterkenny in Donegal. The other incident is thought to have occurred at a Dublin facility. In response a HSE spokesperson said that the organisation ‘takes all breaches of data protection seriously and manages all breaches of data protection in line with data protection legislation and HSE policy’.
In a meeting of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Health this morning, HSE Chair Ciaran Devane said that the board of the health service was informed of the inquiry yesterday and will be discussing the issue of data security when it comes to physical records.
