It was last summer that an unauthorized person broke into the private car of a police officer in Bergen and stole the recorder. The officer brought equipment to work from home. The theft was reported to the employer and to the Norwegian Data Protection Authority on 14 June. The latter is looking at the matter seriously. Eight people were injured According to a document news has seen, eight people were injured in the incident. One of them complained that the hearing had gone astray. The police handled the complaint and the case is closed from the police’s side. What the conclusion is, Lars Morten Lothe, chief of the central Bergen police station, cannot comment on. DEVIATION: The theft of the recorder happened last summer. The case has been registered as a deviation, according to Lars Morten Lothe, chief at Bergen city center police station. Photo: Mats Arnesen / news – What type of case did the hearing deal with? “Unfortunately, I have no information about that, but the criminal cases to which the question is related are not victims,” says Lothe. – How can they know that the incident has not affected the criminal case itself? – There is no reason to believe that. The content was secured in the police’s own central system. We have many dictaphones and they are not personal equipment, so it is not possible for an outsider to know what the individual dictaphone contains, says Lothe. But the interview contained information that made it possible to identify the persons who were interviewed. The case has been treated as a deviation. Lothe cannot comment on the consequences of the case for the police officer in question. – It is a matter that we have dealt with internally as a personnel matter, he says. The thief and the recorder have still not been found. The police also have no suspects in the case. news has been in contact with the Attorney General about the case, but they do not want to comment on the case and refer it to the police. The Norwegian Data Protection Authority: – Seriously, following the incident, the police have received new routines for how they will handle interviews in the future. They have gone through the rules on confidentiality and routines for confidential material. This also applies to securing sound recording and deletion on the voice recorder. – We have created routines so that this will not happen again, says Lothe, who sees the matter as a routine failure. The police chief says it is important that inquiries do not go astray. Only those who must have access to the information to process the criminal cases must have this, he says. The Norwegian Data Protection Authority was notified of the theft of the recorder. Maren Vaagan, legal professional director of the Norwegian Data Protection Authority, says they have finished processing the case. Photo: Ilja C. Hendel The Norwegian Data Protection Authority was notified of the incident last summer. – It is basically a very serious matter, says Maren Vaagan, legal professional director of the Norwegian Data Protection Authority. Interviews in criminal cases are confidential and can contain very sensitive information, says Vaagan, and add: – In the worst case, interviews can end up in the wrong hands, and we take that seriously, she says. The Danish Data Protection Authority closed the case just before Christmas without going into it further. – We have been informed about the measures taken by the police, and have no reason to follow up further, says Vaagan. Deviations according to the Police Register Act are not unusual, according to the professional director. The Norwegian Data Protection Authority has received reports of other cases where police interrogations have gone astray. But how common or unusual this is, Vaagan cannot comment on. In 2014, a voice recorder was stolen in a murder case.
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