I think 99.999% of people in the UK have never met, or heard of, Mr. Stephen McCartney. Those attending data protection conferences might recall him speaking about his policy role at Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO); indeed we have asked him to speak at our Update sessions because he is articulate and thought provoking.
Yet Mr. McCartney has become a central figure in the national press and the blogosphere over a story about the ICO’s investigation into Google’s StreetView.
Mr. McCartney is not a public figure. He is not a celebrity, nor related to one, nor has he been involved in an incident which attracts the attention of the tabloids. He was not involved in investigations for the ICO. He has not broken any law, nor taken a bribe, nor involved in any malfeasance. He is for all intents and purposes, an ordinary member of the public.
So why is Mr. McCartney the centre of attention? The reason is that his new employer, Google (who are not flavour of the month and never will be one suspects) and his old employer, the Information Commissioner (who has been widely chastised for not enforcing the Data Protection Act with respect of Google StreetView) have all attracted negative press commentary for various reasons.
Both these coincidences have conspired together: journalists looking to develop an angle on the Google StreetView story have added two plus two to produce a five star fiction centred on Mr. McCartney as potential leading villain. The matter is serious as this story has appeared in the Daily Telegraph, The Guardian, The Times, the Daily Mail and the BBC web-site and from thence into the trade press and blogosphere.
Consider how the Daily Mail (see references) headlined the story. “Boss at data watchdog that 'let off' Google in much-derided probe gets a job... at Google!”. It’s and eye-catching headline:- pity about the inconvenient fact that Mr. McCartney is not a “boss” nor did he have any involvement in the “much-derided probe” into Google.
The Daily Mail line continues “In 2010, following an inquiry that lasted just three hours, the ICO cleared Google. Eighteen months later, Mr. McCartney joined Google as its privacy manager”. Does this combination of sentences from the same paragraph suggest they are connected and that possibly, Mr. McCartney has been “rewarded” for his “work” on the Google inquiry?
Even Mr. McCartney’s contacts with the ICO get the innuendo treatment. The Daily Mail states that “But his close relationship with the ICO remained and in May he even emailed his former colleagues to complain about media reporting of the (Google) case. Christopher Graham, the Information Commissioner, responded to the email with a message saying: ‘Thanks for this, Stephen”.
I suppose the Daily Mail expects that Mr. McCartney should cut himself off from his work colleagues of seven years; perhaps it thinks, also, that the Commissioner should also ignore his previous employee’s involvement at his office and end his letters with the words “Sod off Stephen”?
The Daily Mail then reports that:
“Tory MP Robert Halfon said the appointment raised questions about the watchdog’s ‘cosy relationship’ with Google. `This is a pretty shocking revelation’, he said. ‘It raises more questions about the Information Commissioner than it does Google because clearly the ICO has been asleep on their watch on this issue. Now it seems they [the ICO] have had a cosy relationship with the company they have been investigating”.
The fact that a Tory MP takes up Mr. McCartney’s new job gives the story credibility and gravitas, does it not? It is therefore of no surprise that some of the Daily Mail’s reader comments, posted under the story, refer to corruption.
My own view with this story is that there is hard reporting of innuendo in order to substantiate that there is a public interest in Mr McCartney. Yet in reality, there is no evidence of anything except someone has changed his job after several years.
How many officials, for instance, have left a regulator after a period of years and gone to work elsewhere in an industry that is subject to regulation? Would this story have been published if, Mr. McCartney, for example, had decided to work as a privacy officer at Barclay’s Bank? I think not.
And what redress is available to Mr. McCartney. Is he expected as an ordinary member of the public to risk all his financial means in order to fund a court case to seek redress? Is there a right to reply? Given that this story remains on the Internet, is there a right to forget?
The short answer is that for all ordinary members of the public in Mr. McCartney’s position there is no effective remedy. One can try the Press Complaints Commission (PCC) but it is common ground, even at the PCC, that this regulator is not fit for purpose.
This is what the Leveson Inquiry is all about. It is not about celebrity peccadilloes; it is about when the Press gets a member of the public in its sights and invents a story which is, quite simply, wrong.
And because employers are increasingly using the Internet, and because the Internet will never forget newspaper stories that have had this degree of coverage, the innuendo of recent days could haunt Mr. McCartney’s career for decades to come.
This explains why Leveson’s conclusions will be very important.
References (Mainstream media sources of innuendo in this case)
The Daily Mail: “Boss at data watchdog that 'let off' Google in much derided probe gets a job... at Google!”: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2170035/Boss-data-watchdog-let-Google-derided-probe-gets-job--Google.html#ixzz1zxCsK0Kc
The Guardian: “Google UK privacy manager worked for ICO during Street View probe”: MP to raise matter in parliament after it emerges Stephen McCartney was at watchdog during controversial investigation””. http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/jul/05/google-uk-privacy-manager-ico?newsfeed=true
The Telegraph: “ICO Employee poached by Google ‘never worked on Streetview’. The Information Commissioner has denied that an employee poached by Google was ever involved in its investigation into Streetview data snooping”: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/google/9381493/ICO-Employee-poached-by-Google-never-worked-on-Streetview.html
The BBC: “Google hired former UK data privacy official: Google UK's privacy policy manager held a senior role at the UK's data privacy watchdog during the time of its original probe into Street View”. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-18720572
The Times: “Google privacy manager worked for ICO” http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/public/profile/Murad-Ahmed
Who bothers about the Daily Mail but it is a pity that the Times seems to regurgitate the same points.
Posted by: Jim Whitaker | 09/07/2012 at 09:07 AM