Municipality Takes Immediate Action Following NOS Investigation into Personal Data
NOS reported today on an investigation into municipalities that insufficiently anonymized personal data before publishing documents online. In Voorschoten, one document was found where this was the case. The municipality has taken immediate measures to correct the error and prevent recurrence.
An online published document from 2020 contained the personal data of the three directors of the Stichting Sociaal Hulpfonds Voorschoten. This concerned an appendix to an amendment to the articles of association, which included the name, address details, date of birth, and passport number of the directors.
Particularly regrettable
The municipality considers this particularly regrettable for the directors involved. As soon as it was notified via the information security service of the VNG, it took the document offline. Fortunately, there are no indications that the data has actually been misused, but the municipality takes the incident very seriously.
Notification data breach
The municipality has informed the directors personally. It is also reporting the data leak to the Dutch Data Protection Authority. Furthermore, the municipality will do everything possible to trace the cause and potential consequences of this incident and will examine how it can check all published documents for personal data.