Further questions for PSNI bosses over timeline of laptop and data theft from car

The convening of the Policing Board will be the second non-scheduled meeting of the oversight body since the PSNI announced details of two major data breaches.

Last Tuesday, the PSNI said the inadvertent release of sensitive information – containing data on all 10,000 police officers and support staff – was on an “industrial scale”.

The incident occurred in response to a routine Freedom of Information request.

The following day, police also revealed that a PSNI laptop, radio and information on 200 staff members, had been stolen from an officer’s private vehicle on July 6.

​As further details emerged, Policing Board member Mike Nesbitt raised concerns that it took eight days for the 200 people mentioned on the data sheet to be notified of the breach.

“The timelines in the statement do not make sense to me. They need interrogation and I intend to do so at the next session between the chief constable and the Policing Board,” he said.

It was confirmed by police earlier this week that the data from last Tuesday’s data breach was in the hands of dissident republicans – after copies were posted on a wall opposite Sinn Fein’s office on the Falls Road in Belfast.

More than 3,000 PSNI employees have now registered an interest in a possible legal action against their employers – with several claiming they are now considering moving house over fears their personal safety has been compromised.

Commenting on his concerns over the theft from the car, Mike Nesbitt said: “For quite some time I have been unhappy with the quality of the information flow from the police to the policing board.

"When I say, quality I mean accuracy. In this case there are several questions arising out of the timeline that they published on Saturday.

"When it came to the 10,000 names, they were able to tell the board, to the exact minute, when the data was uploaded, when they contacted the information commissionser… yet when it comes to the deactivation of this stolen laptop all they can say is that it was deactivated ‘soon afterwards’. Soon after the 6 July. Surely they should be able to tell us to the very minute, to the very second, when the deactivation was complete."

Mr Nesbitt added: "So my question is, why are you being so vague about when it was deactivated? The suspicion is [it was] because you didn’t know it was deactivated."

One man was arrested in Lurgan on Wednesday by detectives investigating the unlawful dissemination of the leaked information.

Police said: “A 39-year-old man has been arrested on suspicion of collection of information likely to be useful to terrorists and is being questioned by detectives at Musgrave Serious Crime Suite.”On Thursday morning, the PSNI said the arrested man had been “released on bail to allow for further police enquiries”.

Responding to the concerns around the theft of the laptop, ACC Chris Todd said: “We updated the NI Policing Board on the Newtownabbey data breach last week. We will continue to keep the board appraised.

"However, as there is an ongoing investigation we have no further comment to make at this time.”