Identity thieves may face prison, warns privacy watchdog

Private detectives and journalists who "blag" confidential details from banks and telecom companies will face unlimited fines and possible imprisonment, the new informa- tion watchdog said yesterday.

Richard Thomas, in his first interview since his appointment as information commissioner, said his investigations team was working on a number of cases involving theft of personal information.

He said some of the worst cases involved tracing agents who had stolen tax details by impersonating an individual and conning Inland Revenue officials into making wrongful disclosures. Last year the information commissioner's department reportedly examined potential breaches of the Data Protection Act 1998 after newspaper stories appeared detailing the tax affairs of Lord Levy, one of Labour's chief fund- raisers, and Lord Ashcroft, a former treasurer of the Conservative Party.

Yesterday, Mr Thomas, a solicitor and former head of public policy at the world's biggest law firm, Clifford Chance, said his team was working with Inland Revenue and social security officials in investigating a number of unnamed cases of "information stealing". His office declined to confirm or deny whether these involved Lord Levy or Lord Ashcroft. He said most of the allegations involved the sale of personal information, which had been obtained through the impersonation of an individual, a fraud he described as "blagging".

He said: "That is absolutely clearly a criminal offence: obtaining information without consent. I find it wholly unacceptable that confidential information is coming out through deception. There are a number of prosecutions ongoing and I anticipate in bringing a whole lot more in the future."

Under the Data Protection Act 1998, obtaining information by deception is a criminal offence punishable by unlimited fine in the Crown Court.

Mr Thomas succeeds Elizabeth France who retired as the first information commissioner in November. She had complained that her efforts had been frustrated by the Government.

Ministers have also been criticised for delaying the implementation of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 until 2005. Mr Thomas warned the Government and thousands of public bodies that he would not tolerate any failure to meet the 2005 deadline.

He said there could be no excuses for not having systems in place to help the disclosure of information to the public. "People will not trust government if there is excessive secrecy," Mr Thomas said. "And they will get increasingly anxious about a surveillance society if they cannot be confident that information about their private lives is being handled properly. My job will be to shed more light on what the public sector is doing in our name with our money. And I must ensure the integrity and proper care of personal information across public and private sectors."

He said he wanted to promote good practice among those who handled official or personal information. Nevertheless, he acknowledged that the fight against terrorism, fraud and other criminal activity meant that there could not be complete openness and necessitated "some intrusion into personal privacy".