“Victoria Police’s digital devices are fitted with a range of security safeguards, including encryption to protect sensitive information, and can be remotely deactivated as soon as they’re reported missing,” they said.
“This data shows theft and loss of electronic equipment is minimal compared with the tens of thousands of devices in use across the force,” a police spokesman says.Credit: Paul Rovere
“Information on portable flash devices can only be stored temporarily, the devices must be encrypted and password protected and there are restrictions on what type of information can be stored in the first place.”
Of the 40 devices in the data spill, there were 20 USB drives, 12 cameras, three external hard drives, two SD cards, a body-worn camera, a phone and a digital voice recorder.
These 40 devices form part of the overall losses of devices over the past decade, including 80 mobile phones, 66 laptops, 27 cameras, more than 50 body-worn cameras, over 110 police radios, nine external hard drives, 20 iPads, more than 30 USBs and over 700 IRIS devices.
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Officers and staff have also reported lost or stolen a breath-tester, six gate remotes, four SD cards (cards which record pictures in digital cameras), and a digital voice recorder with data on it.
The Office of the Victorian Information Commissioner is investigating whether Victoria Police complies with its obligations under privacy laws to protect personal information from being deliberately mishandled by its employees.
Privacy and Data Protection Deputy Commissioner Rachel Dixon said the information commissioner expected public sector organisations to understand and meet their information and data security obligations under privacy laws.
“The Office of the Victorian Information Commissioner conducts investigations to determine whether a regulated body has breached an information privacy principle, code of practice or information usage arrangement and, if so, whether the breach is serious or flagrant,” Dixon said.
Dixon declined to comment on whether this newly discovered breach was being probed.
Police accountability expert Jeremy King, from Robinson Gill lawyers, said he had observed Victoria Police data protection was often outdated and that police had remote access to databases from devices like iPads, which caused concern if they were lost.
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The Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission and integrity officers within Victoria Police have investigated and prosecuted officers for accessing internal police databases without authorisation.
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