Fintan Warfield (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State to the House. This is a very broad topic. I will focus on a couple of areas that I have recently brought up on the Order of Business. The first is the procurement of facial recognition technology by the Government. The State is going to begin the procurement of body cameras that make use of facial recognition software despite there currently being no legislation to provide for the use of such technology. At a time when many cities across the world are banning the use of facial technology in policing, I am concerned that Ireland is pressing ahead and purchasing cameras that have this ability built in. There are obviously significant questions of human rights and EU law involved that require robust debate here in the Houses of the Oireachtas, our Parliament. Does the Minister of State have anything to say about the State purchasing such cameras without any legislative provision or safeguards?

I also want to talk about the public services card. The Department of Social Protection has been building a biometric photo and template database of more than 3 million people. There is no legal basis for collecting these data in exchange for services that people are legally entitled to. Through a freedom of information request, the Irish Council for Civil Liberties and Digital Rights Ireland have found out that the Department of Social Protection has known since 2021 that this database is illegal. The processing of people's personal and sensitive data naturally impacts on people who use this card, primarily people who access State supports. I would welcome the Minister of State's comments on that issue. It is possibly a mass infringement of privacy by the State.

I now come to the Data Protection Commission. Last year, the Minister for Justice committed to appointing two additional data protection commissioners. As far as I am aware, these posts have not yet been advertised. At the time this was announced last year, the Minister indicated that it was expected that the process would take in the region of six months to complete. However, almost 12 months later, these positions have yet to be advertised, much less filled. The Government's failure to appoint these two additional data protection commissioners leaves the Data Protection Commission ill-equipped to fully investigate the range of complaints it receives. GDPR provides strong investigation and enforcement powers to protect people from the misuse of data but, without these resources, the job of the Data Protection Commission becomes ever more difficult. It was interesting to listen to Senator Seery Kearney talking about the cultural shift that has happened. Many people just do not see data as a human rights issue. I have taken the time over the years to look at alternatives to the mainstream big tech platforms. There are alternative platforms that respect people's privacy and do not track what a person does in the context of advertising, and that do not sell personal data on. For example, Qwant is an alternative search engine, Signal is an alternative messaging service and Proton Mail is an alternative email service. There are other social media alternatives also. With social media and the messaging apps, one needs a host of a one's friend group to be on a particular app in order for it to be effective. There are alternatives to big tech.

In 2021, the Joint Committee on Justice called for a review of the Data Protection Act 2018 to ascertain if legislative amendments would be required and to consider codifying some Data Protection Commission processes in legislation. I do not know if there has been any move by Government to review the Data Protection Act 2018. I welcome the Minister of State's comments on any or all of these points.