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Neutral Citation Number:	2012 UKUT 464 AAC
Reported Number:
File Number:	GIA 1598 2012
Appellant:	Edem
Respondent:	The Information Commissioner and the FSA
Judge/Commissioner:	Judge E. Jacobs
Date Of Decision:	07/02/2014
Date Added:	31/01/2013
Main Category:	Information rights
Main Subcategory:	Data protection
Secondary Category:
Secondary Subcategory:
Notes:	UTAAC and CA decision reported as [2014] AACR 19. Data protection – the meaning of “personal data” – when does disclosure contravene the data protection principles The Financial Services Authority (FSA) refused Mr Edem’s application under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 which included a request for the names of the FSA officers who dealt with his case. Mr Edem complained to the Information Commissioner whereupon the FSA sent to him some information but not the names of the three officers concerned. The Commissioner accepted that Mr Edem had a legitimate interest in the grade of the officers who had dealt with his case but that any legitimate interest he had in the disclosure of their names was outweighed by the prejudice it would cause to the officer’s rights and freedoms. The First-tier Tribunal (F-tT) upheld Mr Edem’s appeal but the Upper Tribunal (UT) reversed that decision on appeal, on the grounds that in reaching its decision the F-tT had misdirected itself on the significance of Auld LJ’s “two notions” in Durant v Financial Services Authority [2003] EWCA Civ 1746 and had also misapplied them. Mr Edem renewed his appeal to the Court of Appeal. The issue before the court was whether disclosure of the names of the officials could be withheld on the grounds that it was personal data and that disclosure of that information would contravene the first principle of the Data Protection Act 1998. Held, dismissing the appeal, that: 1. the individuals could be identified from their names and the documents obtained from the FSA. A person’s name, in conjunction with job-related information, was his personal data (see Case C-101/01 Criminal Proceedings against Lindqvist [2003] ECR I-12971 and Case C-28/08 Commission v Bavarian Lager [2010] ECR I-6055). To argue that it was not possible to identify the officers from their names merely because they had previously worked for the FSA misunderstood the concept of an identifiable natural person. Personal data was data which related to a living individual “who can be identified”. That was a different concept from whether the person can in fact be contacted or traced. To disclose the names of the officers would be to disclose their personal data (paragraphs 13 to 14); 2. the F-tT was wrong to apply Auld LJ’s “two notions” in this case. There was no reason to do so. The information was plainly concerned with the three individuals. Neither of Auld LJ’s “two notions” had any application and to seek to do so ran contrary to the Data Protection Act 1998, the Directive 95/46/EC, and the jurisprudence of the Court of the Justice of the European Union (see Case C-101/01 Criminal Proceedings against Lindqvist [2003] ECR I-12971 and Case C-28/08 Commission v Bavarian Lager [2010] ECR I-6055) (paragraph 17); 3. in a case such as the instant appeal, questions of whether the information is biographical or sufficiently focussed upon a particular named individual are of no relevance whatever. They have nothing to do with the question whether disclosure of a person’s name is disclosure of personal data. A name is personal data unless it is so common that without further information, such as its use in a work context, a person would remain unidentifiable despite its disclosure. In this case the three names referred to in the e-mails were obviously about those three individuals and no further enquiry was needed. The Upper Tribunal (UT) was right to reject the approach of the F-tT which was wrong as a matter of law (paragraph 20).
Decision(s) to Download:	[2014] AACR 19bv.doc