ICO calls for projects on data sharing in public interest as part of “regulatory sandbox”

The Information Commissioner’s Office has called for projects to be submitted that support complex data sharing in the public interest, after re-opening its “regulatory sandbox”.

The sandbox, a free service, is designed to support organisations using personal data to develop innovative products and services.

This year the projects submitted are required to focus on either children’s privacy or data sharing. “The projects should be at the cutting edge of innovation and may be operating in particularly challenging areas of data protection, where there is genuine uncertainty about what compliance looks like.”

The regulatory sandbox is designed to enable organisations to work through how they use personal data in their projects with the ICO’s specialist staff to help ensure they comply with data protection rules.

It also provides organisations with reassurance from enforcement action, where feasible, and increased public trust that innovative products and services are not in breach of data protection legislation, the ICO said.

Ian Hulme, Director of Regulatory Assurance at the ICO, said: “We are looking for viable projects from all sizes of organisations that have the potential to be transformative, and which will bring real public benefit.

“Protecting children’s privacy online is a high priority for the ICO. Ultimately the regulatory sandbox aims to support innovators to improve confidence amongst children, young people and their parents and carers that their personal information is being properly protected when they are online.

“On data sharing our aim is to promote and enable confident, responsible and lawful data sharing in the wider public interest. In particular, the regulatory sandbox aims to help demonstrate that data protection legislation is not a barrier to proportionate sharing of personal data.”

The ICO said it would accept applications from all types of organisations from start-ups, SMEs and large organisations, across private, public and voluntary sectors. It warned though that places are limited.

The watchdog introduced the regulatory sandbox as a beta service last year and ten organisations have so far had the opportunity to engage with the watchdog; draw upon its expertise and advice on mitigating risks and ‘data protection by design’, whilst ensuring that appropriate protections and safeguards are in place.

The ICO also recently blogged about and published two outcome reports. Others are set to follow, it said.