MR JUSTICE WARBY
Approved Judgment
NT1 & NT2 v Google LLC
taken place before it has effect. I do not myself detect such an approach as
explicit or implicit in Google Spain.
(2)
I also reject Mr Tomlinson’s approach. As indicated when dealing with the
Inaccuracy Issue, I do consider the flexibility of the remedies provided for by
the DPA and DP Directive to be an important feature of the law in this area.
But it would be unsatisfactory, and I think Ms Proops is right to say
unprincipled, to leave so much to the discretion of the Court.
(3)
The solution that fits best with the structure of the law and the decision of the
CJEU is, in my judgment, the one advocated by the ICO. But I am reluctant to
take the radical step of disapplying any part of the DPA. There is a powerful
argument that the scheme of the DPA is incompatible with fundamental rights,
as it fails to recognise any possibility of a free speech justification for the
processing of sensitive personal data without consent. But the same would
seem to be true of the DP Directive which, in this respect, the DPA merely
mirrors. The CJEU did not need to confront this issue in Google Spain, as the
data in that case, though “sensitive” in the colloquial sense as they concerned
personal financial matters, were not “special category data” within Article 8 of
the DP Directive. In my judgment, it is not necessary to go as far as the ICO
contends. On the facts of this case, at least, I need not confront the question of
disapplication. I consider that a Schedule 3 condition is met.
(3) The DPA Compliance Issue
106.
The First Principle. On the facts of this case, the general requirements of this
Principle, that processing be “fair and lawful” add nothing to the particular
requirements, that processing comply with at least one Schedule 2 condition and, if
the data are sensitive personal data, at least one condition in Schedule 3. Most of the
personal data with which I am concerned are sensitive personal data and it is
convenient to start with Schedule 3.
107.
Schedule 3. I reject most of Google’s arguments that its processing was compliant
with Schedule 3. The processing of NT1’s data by making them available to those
who search on his name was not, nor is it, “necessary for the purposes of exercising
legal rights” within Condition 6(c) of Schedule 3. The rights relied on those of
internet users under Article 10 of the Convention and Articles 8 and 11 of the Charter,
as well as the Article 16 freedom of Google to conduct a business. I do not consider
that broad interpretation can stand. As Ms Proops and Mr Tomlinson submit, this
condition must be applied in conformity with Article 8.2(e) of the DP Directive,
which uses the terms “legal claims”; its “focus is on the protection of underlying
rights”: R (British Telecommunications plc) v Secretary of State for Culture,
Olympics, Media and Sport [2012] EWCA Civ 232 [2012] Bus L R 1766 [74].
108.
Google’s reliance on paragraph 7A of Schedule 3 is close to unarguable. That
condition applies to processing of information “disclosed by an anti-fraud
organisation”. It is said that this paragraph should be given a wide interpretation,
encompassing both public and private sector organisations concerned with exposing
and preventing wrongdoing. I have seen nothing to warrant such a broad
interpretation of wording which, on its face, appears to be specific and relatively
narrow in ambit.