In a new briefing, the charity Big Brother Watch highlights that among other serious concerns, Government amendments to the Bill would introduce new powers to force banks to monitor all bank accounts to find benefit claimants and report anyone who triggers potential fraud indicators (such as frequent travel or savings over a certain amount) to the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP).
Under current rules, the DWP is able to request bank account holders’ bank transaction details on a case-by-case basis if there is reasonable grounds to suspect fraud.
However, this new power would allow the DWP to access the personal data of benefit claimants by requiring the third party served with a notice – such as a bank or building society - to conduct mass monitoring without suspicion of fraudulent activity.
Once issued, an account information notice requires the receiver to give the Secretary of State the names of the holders of accounts. In order to do this, the bank will have to process the data of all bank account holders and run automated surveillance scanning for benefit recipients.
In addition, the Bill specifies that an account information notice requires “other specified information relating to the holders of those accounts” and other connected information “as may be specified”. This vague definition would allow for an incredibly broad scope of information to be requested. – something the DWP itself has acknowledged itself
Big Brother Watch says: “There is no explanation provided as to how these new surveillance powers will be able to differentiate between cases of intentional fraud and accidental error.
“The scale of surveillance suggested by these powers is so vast that scanning for such ‘indicators’ is likely to be automated - therefore resulting in huge numbers of false positives. Such mistakes will have serious ramifications.
“Innocent people could lose their benefits for no good reason, resulting in the inability to pay heating bills, purchase medical supplies, or afford basic necessities such as food.”
The charity adds that it is “wholly inappropriate for the UK Government to order private banks, building societies and other financial services to conduct mass, algorithmic, suspicionless surveillance and reporting of their account holders on behalf of the state in pursuit of its policy aims.
…“The Government should not intrude on the privacy of anyone’s bank account in this country without very good reason, whether a person is receiving benefits or not.
“People who are disabled, sick, carers, looking for work, or indeed linked to any of those people should not be treated like criminals by default.”
…“This level of financial intrusion and monitoring affecting millions of people is highly likely to result in serious mistakes and sets an incredibly dangerous precedent.
“… Such a decision will allow disproportionate and intrusive surveillance of people in the welfare system - that means that people including some of the poorest in our society, people with disabilities (including illnesses such as cancer), carers, or even elderly people depending on pensions will be subject to their spending essentially being pre-emptively examined, rather than on suspicion.”
DR UK shares the view of Big Brother Watch that the theses surveillance measures would be a “wholly unnecessary” and “disproportionate violation” of claimants’ privacy and that: “It is vital that these powers are removed to prevent expansive surveillance of millions of members of the public, with disproportionate detrimental impact upon people in the welfare system and individuals linked to them.”
For more information see the BBW Briefing on the Data Protection and Digital Information 2.0 Bill for House of Lords Second Reading available from bigbrotherwatch.org.uk.
You can also sign the BBW Stop the Government from spying on all of our bank accounts petition to the PM at 38degrees.org.uk.
Note: The BBW Briefing outlines other measures in the Bill relating to
- Weakening Data Rights
- Automated Decision-Making
- Digital Identity Framework Verification
- the Retention Of Biometric Data