The Commissioner's Office for information has taken action against 3 county councils because they breached the Data Protection Act
. It is suspected that there was a lack of training for the on the handling of personal information which led to the loss of some sensitive personal information that related to numerous children at the London Borough of Barnet, Buckinghamshire County Council and the West Sussex County Council. An employee downloaded some data onto unencrypted devices without having the authority to do so. Later it was r revealed that there wasn't any security in place to prevent these downloads or any security in place. The Commissioner's office conducted an audit of the London Borough of Barnet before this incident that also mentioned a lack of training for the staff. In addition, West Sussex County Council had a laptop stolen from an employee's home that had sensitive personal data that related to an unknown number of families and children that were involved in proceedings that dealt with childcare. The laptop computer was unencrypted and Commissioner's office determined that the employee hadn't had any formal Information Technology/data protection training. In addition, it was determined that more than 2,300 unencrypted laptops were probably still in use in various council services. Steps are currently underway to encrypt the laptops. Lastly, the Buckinghamshire County Council gave a report with regard to of documents at Heathrow Airport that contained sensitive personal data that related to 2 children. These documents were in a plastic wallet that belonged to an employee who was doing council social work and was travelling to another city in the United Kingdom in connection with the children's social care case. Further analysis was conducted by the Commissioner's office which found out that apparently no real consideration had been given to the security of this personal data while the employee was travelling. In addition, it was determined that many of the council's policies were in need of revision and that that staff training with regard to data protection was inadequate. . All 3 councils have signed a formal undertaking to make sure that the staff will be made completely aware of the council's policies as associated with the use and storage of personal data. The West County Council and the London Borough of Barnet will also provide the appropriate training for Information Technology security and data protection and make sure that mobile and portable computers that are used to transmit and store personal data are encrypted. The Commissioner's office also made it clear that an additional audit will be conducted on the London Borough of Barnet very soon in order to monitor the recommendations that have been made previously.