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VISITOR BOOKS WILL be returned to heritage sites such as Dublin Castle and Kilmainham Gaol after they were removed due to fears over data protection.
The Office of Public Works (OPW) said it has “reviewed its approach” to banning visitor books at the start of the tourism season.
The books had been removed over fears of breaching the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).
The Data Commission called this move a “disproportionate approach to data protection principles”. It was also criticised by data consultants who called it “excessive”.
“The Data Protection Commission has confirmed that our interpretation may have erred on the side of caution and that there is no legal risk,” said Frank Shalvey, head of OPW’s visitor services division in a statement.
“The visitor season is at its peak right now and we would expect thousands of people to come to our sites throughout the remainder of July and August in particular and we are delighted to offer them the opportunity to leave comments on the books.”
The OPW had withdrawn visitor comment books from sites after being given advice that they could be at risk of non-compliance with the GDPR. This would happen if visitors wrote down their personal details such as names and addresses, the OPW was informed.
“According to the advice received by OPW, this ran the risk of being viewed by other people who could retrieve visitors’ personal data for purposes other than that for which it was offered, potentially placing the organisation in breach of the GDPR,” the statement said.
The OPW will now review its use of Visitor Books with a view to reinstating them while ensuring compliance with the key GDPR principles.
The books were banned from heritage sites such as Dublin Castle, Kilmainham Gaol and Muckross House.
The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) was put in place in May 2018 in EU legislation. It is a set of rules aimed to give EU citizens more control over their personal data.
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Maybe they could concentrate on multinationals. Millions of people’s private information are hacked, regularly.
This has about as much chance of protecting people’s private information as banning small plastic bottles has of slowing climate change.
If this is the kind of time wasting that goes on at the OPW then it needs to be reviewed. If banning visitor books is the most innovative move they have then privacy is already dead.
Visitors’ Books. How absurd. The GDPR has gone way too far. 1984 has well and truly arrived. What next, a Ministry of Information looking for endless ways to control the population? Maybe Mick Wallace might speak up in the European Parliament against the absurdity of its provisions?
What fool and snowflake in the OPW made the decision to remove visitor books from among Ireland’s most popular visitor attractions in the first place?
The visitor books should be reinstated immediately, in their traditional form, and the OPW bureaucrat in question should be sacked, immediately, for making such an inappropriate and disproportionate decision which would have damaged the visitor experience at iconic Irish heritage locations.
good to see common sense prevail……although one HAS to ask the question what all these people in govt bodies and positions doing to be so clueless about something like GDPR in the first place ?? Who gave the advice there could be a ‘risk’ and ‘potential breach’ , who took that advice without questioning ? How come there are Visitors Committees and boards and bodies and bureaucrats that need until July 26th to know what anybody with a semblance of knowledge and common sense could tell you….that this was an idiotic over reach clutching to GDPR as an excuse for stupidity…..
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