23 March 2012

Privacy Commissioner, Marie Shroff said today that the Office of the Privacy Commissioner, in conjunction with the ACC Board, has commissioned an independent inquiry and approved the terms of reference into the recent privacy incident at ACC.

KPMG, and privacy expert Malcolm Crompton, former Australian Federal Privacy Commissioner, have been appointed to conduct the inquiry.

'I am pleased to see the terms of reference finalised, ' Marie Shroff said. 'This was a large data breach where a spreadsheet containing information about thousands of claims has been emailed to an ACC claimant. It has raised a number of concerning questions.

'The inquiry will look into the circumstances surrounding this particular incident. The inquiry will also look more widely at whether systemic or organisational weaknesses exist in the way personal information is handled by ACC.

Ms Shroff said that her office was involved in finalising the terms of reference and also in suggesting former Australian Federal Privacy Commissioner, Malcolm Crompton, as an expert independent reviewer.

'We will be kept informed of progress of the review and will await the results and recommendations with interest,' said Ms Shroff.

The review team will report their findings to the ACC Board and to the Privacy Commissioner.

Individual privacy complaints about the data breach will be handled as usual by the Privacy Commissioner complaints investigation process.

See the terms of reference for the review. These can also be viewed on www.acc.co.nz.

ENDS

For further information contact Annabel Fordham on 021 509 735