Security

A data protection specialist claims that users can gain control of their browsing history and have it protected by the UK’s Data Protection Act just by contacting companies such as Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft and telling them their identities. There is debate in privacy circles about when identifying information such as a computer user's internet protocol (IP) address counts as 'personal data'. Information which does count as personal data qualifies for legal protection under the Data Protection Act. Companies and privacy regulators are agreed that IP addresses can be, and indeed often are, 'personal data' as defined in the UK law and the EU Directive on which it is based. But most observers stop short of saying that an IP address is always 'personal data'. Now data protection specialist Dr Chris Pounder of Amberhawk Training has said that there is a way in which internet users can force companies to consider information held about them as 'personal data'.

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