Annex D
Privacy Sub-committee of the Law Reform Commission:
Recommendations on Data Access
The recommendations are as follows :
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(a) An interested individual should be legally entitled to be informed by a data user whether the latter's data refer to that individual; and if so, to be supplied with a copy of that data.
(b)
(c)
(a)
(e)
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Upon receipt of an inquiry as to whether data exist which is unaccompanied by a request of such data, the data user has a discretion as to whether he
he shall provide a copy of that data. (The UK Act treats all data subject inquiries as a request for a copy of any data relating to the inquirer. This approach is not recommended.)
No fee should be payable by a data subject for inquiring as to whether data exist relating to him.
A nominal (not cost-related) fee should be payable for full access requests which require the supply of a copy of data held, to deter mischievous requests. It should operate as a maximum, and organisations should be at liberty to reduce or even waive it.
in
Access fees should be provided for subsidiary legislation and in a manner facilitating their updating as required.
Data access requests should be in a recorded form, although data users may waive this requirements and accept requests by terminals or telephone.
(£) Data provided in response to access requests should be in an intelligible form, unless it is a true copy of a written document which is unintelligible on its face. As Hong Kong is a multilingual society, data should be supplied in the language of the request when this is in Chinese or English. Where this entails a translation, this should be provided by the data protection authority at a nominal fee.
(g)
Access requests be responded to within 30 days, in the absence of a reasonable excuse.