Seán Sherlock
Question:470. Deputy Sean Sherlock asked the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth the number of data breaches in Tusla in each of the past five years and to date in 2021. [29130/21]
View answerTuesday, 1 June 2021
Questions (470)
Written answers
The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) May 2018 requires parties to “document any personal data breaches, comprising the facts relating to the personal data breach”. GDPR came into force across the European Union on 25 May 2018 and Tusla has been collecting the required data. Tusla has advised that information on breaches was not routinely collected in the years prior to the introduction of GDPR. Accordingly, the information requested by the Deputy is not available for the years 2016 and 2017.
Tusla has advised of the following number of data breaches in the years 2018 to date (up to 22 April 2021):
|
Year |
Count |
|
2018 (01/01 – 24/05) |
data not available |
|
2018 (25/05 – 31/12) |
71 |
|
2019 |
130 |
|
2020 |
362 |
|
2021 (01/01 – 22/04) |
109 |
Tusla's work involves the receipt, processing and storage of a large volume of highly sensitive and confidential personal data. The handling and protection of personal data in a safe and responsible way is the responsibility of each staff member in the organisation. Tusla regrets that data breaches can occur and the significant impact they may have on service users who are affected. Tusla has established a dedicated GDPR programme for the Agency, in order to enhance its compliance with GDPR, and to drive improvements across the organisation in this area.