An examination of the United Kingdom's Data Protection Act of 1998

The development of the society from the industrial age to the information age has brought about tension between privacy rights on the one hand, and free access to information/use of personal details by organisations and government on the other hand. As an individual has a right to privacy/data protection, so do organisations and government have legitimate reasons to gather and process data of private individuals. In some instances, an individual¿s privacy right may be conceded for organisational or governmental interests including public safety, or security reasons. Hence, this work will examine the UK Data Protection Act of 1998 with the aim of determining whether a balance between the competing interests above can be struck.