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HMP Thameside

Collection of personal information

Privacy Notice for visitors
 

Why do we collect your personal information and what lawful basis do we have?

Your personal information, as defined under Section 3(2) of the Data Protection Act 2018 and Article 4 of the UK General Data Protection Regulations, is collected and processed by Serco, the “processor”, on behalf of the Ministry of Justice, who are the “data controller” of your personal information; in relation to the processing of personal information, “processor” and “controller” are defined under section 3(6) of the Data Protection Act 2018.

We need to collect personal information about you to comply with Prison Rules permitting social and professional visits in order to facilitate your visit to this establishment and to maintain its security, good order and discipline and the prevention and detection of crime in the establishment; this is the lawful basis for the processing of your personal information 

We are permitted to collect your personal information under the Prison Act 1952, the Prison Rules 1999, the Offender Management Act 2007 and the Children’s Act 2004; we process it under Part 3 of the Data Protection Act 2018.

For identification purposes we shall collect: your name, date of birth, address, a photograph and biometric template of your fingerprint; an actual fingerprint is not collected or held, only a series of reference points from a fingerprint are collected to create a unique identification pattern.

We also will only ask for the personal information we need in order to admit you to our establishment and will not collect information that is unnecessary. 

We do not collect biometric readings or photographs of children under the age of 10, however with the use of CCTV and body-worn videa cameras, images of children under the age of 10 may routinely be captured. 

All processing of your information is carried out only in the United Kingdom; storage of this information is also in the UK.

Data sharing

Serco will never use your data for marketing purposes, nor ever transfer your data to another organisation for the purpose of marketing; however, we may disclose your personal information to other statutory organisations for when we need to do so as required by law under Data Protection Act 2018 Part 3 “Processing of Personal Data for Law Enforcement Purposes”.

Use of CCTV and body-worn video cameras

This establishment operates CCTV throughout the site which is continuously recording images.

Body-worn video cameras are in use and carried by Custodial staff but are only activated in the event of an incident; when activated audio is recorded also.

Rights of access, correction, erasure and restriction

You have legal rights in connection with personal information. Under certain circumstances, by law you have the right to:

  • Request access to your personal information (commonly known as a “subject access request”); this enables you to receive a copy of the personal information we hold about you and to check that we are lawfully processing it. 

  • Request correction of the personal information that we hold about you; this enables you to have any incomplete or inaccurate information we hold about you corrected.

  • Request erasure of your personal information; this enables you to ask us to delete or remove personal information where there is no good reason for us continuing to process it and you also have the right to ask us to delete or remove your personal information where you have exercised your right to object to processing. Please note this will prevent you from visiting our establishment.

  • Object to processing of your personal information by us or on our behalf in certain situations. Please note this will prevent you from visiting our establishment.

  • Request the restriction of processing of your personal information. This enables you to ask us to suspend the processing of personal information about you, for example if you want us to establish its accuracy or the reason for processing it.

If you want to review, verify, correct or request erasure of your personal information, or object to the processing of your personal data, please submit your requests in writing to MoJ (Data Controller), 102 Petty France, LONDON, SW1H 9AJ and it will be considered if relevant and legal to do so.

Retention of data

Your personal data is retained in accordance with Ministry of Justice retention policy; these depend on the nature of the information (e.g. we apply different retention periods to different types of information, such as CCTV and body-worn video camera footage and may be subject to change: 

Prisoner visitor records, including biometric data and information on past and future visits     =6 years
Other visitors to establishment, such as official visitors =1 year (from date of last visit)

If you have any questions or concerns about how long we retain your personal data, please contact: The Data Protection Officer, Ministry of Justice, 102 Petty France, LONDON, SW1H 9AJ.

Complaints about how we collect and process your personal information

If you have further concerns then you are able to contact the Information Commissioner for independent advice about data protection matters: Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF. (www.ico.org.uk)