Poorly folded letters lead to exposure of medical data
gdpr nhs · 11 comments · 400 words · read ~261 times.
I returned home from holiday to a pile of letters. Mostly junk, a few Christmas cards, and something from the NHS.
This is what the envelope looked like:
As it happens, I'm not particularly concerned about who knows I had a fairly normal medical procedure. I've blogged a bit about it and Tweeted about the experience in an attempt to de-stigmatise it.
But there will be plenty of people who are mortified that their postie knows that someone shoved a camera up their bum. Or that other people living in their home know that their guts are playing up. I'm sure you can imagine a worst-case scenario.
There are several ways to prevent this - each with potential drawbacks:
- Use a cover sheet which only has the address on. Will this double the cost?
- Print the address on one side of the paper and the letter on the other side. How does that test with users though?
- Don't use a windowed envelope and print the address separately. Are there cost implications?
- Ensure that the first few lines don't contain any sensitive information. How can that be enforced?
- Manually check outgoing letters to ensure they're compliant. Again, what's the cost of that?
I'm sure you can think of a few more. Some people have even tried to standardise this:
Thankfully, the letter told me that I didn't need an additional screening. Which was something of a relief.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to find the Data Protection Officer and become a pain in their arse!
Zoë Turner says:
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