Maureen O'Sullivan (Dublin Central, Independent)
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225. To ask the Minister for Social Protection the instances in which persons' personal information is shared with third party companies; if PPS numbers, for instance, are treated with confidentiality; his Department's policy on sharing PPS numbers and personal details with contracted companies such as in the case of a person (details supplied); and if he will make a statement on the matter. [38363/16]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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My Department contracts with a range of third parties including private companies to act as its agent for the purposes of transacting its business and with whom it shares customer information. These include my Department’s branch offices, the Local Employment Service (LES) companies as well as the JobPath companies.

As the Deputy will be aware, JobPath is an employment activation service that supports people who are long-term unemployed and those most at risk of becoming long-term unemployed to secure and sustain paid employment. The JobPath service supplements the internal case management capacity of the Department’s Intreo offices and that delivered under contract by Local Employment Service companies.

Shared information may include such things as the person’s PPS number, name, contact details, gender, education, work experience and welfare claim details. All such information is treated confidentially. The purpose of sharing this information is to assist in the development of tailored personal progression plans for individual jobseekers in order to support them back into paid employment.

The JobPath companies may use personal data only for the purposes of delivering the services for the Department. Employees of the JobPath companies, and their subcontractors, are subject to the same data protection laws as departmental staff. Data is transmitted securely from the Department to the companies using secure Departmental approved transmission channels. The JobPath companies are registered with the Office of the Data Protection Commissioner and are subject to the provisions of data protection legislation. The providers are obliged to observe the principles of data protection, which requires that personal data is used solely for the purposes for which it is collected. Any breach or suspected breach of the data protection legislation will be a matter for the Office of the Data Protection Commissioner.

I hope this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.