Supplementary written evidence submitted
by the Information Commissioner's Office
When we spoke on the phone recently you asked
if the ICO could supply the following:
— A sample of redacted information: Enclosed
are two samples.[118]
The "hard redaction" sample is where we have simply
removed any personally identifiable information. The "soft
redaction" sample is where the personally identifiable information
that has been removed has been replaced by a description of its
nature. The pages of the samples should be read side by side as
each line in a ledger runs across all three pages. In both soft
and hard redacted cases the samples represent a one page extract
from a Motorman ledger.
— Further explanation of the staff time involved
in redaction: Producing the enclosed "soft redaction"
sample took an experienced member of staff who is familiar with
the details of the Motorman enquiry around 10 mins. Scaling this
up to the approx 17,500 lines of text in the four ledgers accounts
for something of the order of 100 hrs of staff time. We estimate
that, on the same basis, similarly redacting the invoices and
other documents in the spreadsheets would take a further 50 hours.
Once time for organising the work, checking the output, staff
breaks (given that this is intensive at screen work) etc is allowed
for we are reaching something close to our original estimate of
30 days of staff time for "soft redaction". We remain
of the view that "hard redaction" would take roughly
half as long.
— A table showing the involvement of individual
publications identified in the Motorman operation: This is enclosed.[119]
The table formed part of our report "What Price Privacy Now?"
although the version attached was actually published as a correction
to the original table that featured in the first edition of the
report.
I hope this additional information is of assistance
to your committee.
November 2009
118 Neither sample published here. Back
119
Table not published here. Back
| 
