If your husband is a bigshot spy chief, how hard is it to understand

that you don't put his picture, and any information, on effing Facebook?
The wife of the new head of MI6 has caused a major security breach and left his family exposed after publishing photographs and personal details on Facebook.

Sir John Sawers is due to take over as chief of the Secret Intelligence Service in November, putting him in charge of all of Britain’s spying operations abroad.

But entries by his wife Shelley on the social networking site have exposed potentially compromising details about where they live and work, their friends’ identities and where they spend their holidays. On the day her husband was appointed she congratulated him on the site using his codename “C”.
There must have been an interesting bunch of conversations about this.


Also from (fG)Britain, and defense of not allowing parents to take pictures of their kids on Sports Day; it might violate the Data Protection Act.
Understandably, some parents are upset at the ban. It feels like another example of “political correctness” gone mad. After all, they argue, how many paedophiles are going to want to pore over footage of children running the egg-and-spoon race?

The truth, however, is more complicated. I’m a parent governor, and when our governing body came to discuss the question of whether to ban cameras from school events, I looked up the guidance provided by our local authority, Hertfordshire. This explained that the main issue for schools is the Data Protection Act (1998), which covers images as well as textual information. A photograph of a pupil is classed as personal data.

As the guidelines state: “when hosting an event where parents are permitted to take photographs or videos, make it clear from the start that any images taken must be for private use only and ask for them not to be put on the Internet. This is to avoid breaching Data Protection legislation (particularly if a parent posts a picture on the web that shows children other than just their own child).”
So, in the holy name of the DPA, you can't take pictures of your kid. Or kids. Or take shots for a friend who can't be there.

There was something the other day, can't find it right now, that one school actually banned parents from Sports Day because 'a pedophile might sneak in'. Ah, the nanny state; it'll take care of you, good and hard.