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By Felicity Ussher, 24 February 2000 00:30

NEWS The UK government's first attempt to store criminal records electronically could threaten individuals' privacy rights, according to the UK data protection watchdog. The National Criminal Records Bureau (NCRB), to be based in Liverpool, will be available across the social services sector, including the private sector employees that serve them. But this could leave individuals open to unacceptable breaches of personal data protection, according to John Woulds, director of operations at the Data Protection Registrar. "The new bureau will make criminal records more widely available, because more organisations will have a right to them." He claimed this could reverse the advances in personal privacy rights made in the Data Protection Act due to come into force this March. These dangers will be avoided if technological differentials - such as access hierarchies to control which organisations can access which data - are built into the archive system. In a statement accompanying the proposals for the NCRB, the Home Office has committed itself to these principles. Woulds said attention to these principles could be the solution: "Potentially, when building a new system like this, all sorts of distinctions can be made." The extent to which data protection rights are observed will depend on which supplier is chosen to develop the archive project. So far the Home Office has shortlisted three: Capita Business Services, eCRES (a consortium of technology providers) and PricewaterhouseCoopers. Woulds explained: "New arrangements for access to criminal records will come into effect in the next couple of years. Criminal work records will be more widely available under those arrangements and individuals will be able to get something called a 'criminal conviction certificate' about their own criminal record, but that will be protected by the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act."