Legal Counsel Looking At My LinkedIn

grangers72

Afternoon All

Been a long while since I posted.

I was declared Bankrupt in November 2009 and discharged in 2010.

I've just returned from a few days away with the family and looked at my LinkedIn account. A guy who is a Legal Counsel for one of my creditors- Virgin- has been on my profile. Very strange as I don't know him, we have no shared contacts and are in totally different professions.

Should I be concerned or am I being paranoid, not nice to be thinking like this after a few lovely days with the family.

Should he contact me reference my past, what advice would you give on how to handle

Thanks in advance

Nick_C

If you are prepared to publish your personal details on line where anyone can look at them, you really can't complain when someone does just that.

jamesd

You are discharged so there should be nothing to be concerned about financially, however there is something to wonder about in terms of the data protection act. What legitimate business purpose does the counsel have for looking at the linkedin account of a discharged bankrupt even if there was a debt before bankruptcy? Unless there is a legitimate business purpose they shouldn't be looking at, collecting and retaining the information.

A generic question about the reason for examining the information is perhaps a good first step, without disclosing yourself any information about bankruptcy, since the person may not actually have looked for that reason.

grangers72

jamesd wrote: »

You are discharged so there should be nothing to be concerned about financially, however there is something to wonder about in terms of the data protection act. What legitimate business purpose does the counsel have for looking at the linked in account of a discharged bankrupt even if there was a debt before bankruptcy? Unless there is a legitimate business purpose they shouldn't be looking at, collecting and retaining the information.

A generic question about the reason for examining the information is perhaps a good first step, without disclosing yourself any information about bankruptcy, since the person may not actually have looked for that reason.

I agree, LinkedIn is a professional business portal- not Facebook. I need to use it to connect with customers, potential new customers and it is a great source of learning and understanding with the various groups in my area of work- I wouldn't use it for any other purpose.

I'll see what happens- it could be pure coincidence- should it lead to anything I will question the ethics of the search

dippy3103

jamesd wrote: »

You are discharged so there should be nothing to be concerned about financially, however there is something to wonder about in terms of the data protection act. What legitimate business purpose does the counsel have for looking at the linked in account of a discharged bankrupt even if there was a debt before bankruptcy? Unless there is a legitimate business purpose they shouldn't be looking at, collecting and retaining the information.

A generic question about the reason for examining the information is perhaps a good first step, without disclosing yourself any information about bankruptcy, since the person may not actually have looked for that reason.

There's no issue under DP. If the profile is in the public domain then anyone can look at it.

Could be a perfectly innocent explanation.

whitegoods_engineer

just stay off linkedin, simple really!

grangers72

I'm 'doing my time'- don't see why I should hide away

longtermplanner

If you have a common name, he may have been looking for eomeone completely different. I wouldn't get paranoid about this, your bankruptcy is ancient history.

antrobus

grangers72 wrote: »

...I'll see what happens- it could be pure coincidence- should it lead to anything I will question the ethics of the search

You can question the "ethics of the search" as much as you like but, unless you can demonstrate that the searcher broke some law or the t&cs of the site, it won't get you anywhere.

jamesd

dippy3103 wrote: »

There's no issue under DP. If the profile is in the public domain then anyone can look at it.

Anyone is technically capable of looking at it but a business is only permitted to do so if it has a legitimate business purpose. Antrobus, the Data Protection Act is the law that will have been broken if thee was no legitimate business purpose.

Grangers72, you might try calling the Information Commissioner's Office helpline to see what they think of it and suggest.

At the moment we simply don't know what the purpose was.

antrobus

jamesd wrote: »

Anyone is technically capable of looking at it but a business is only permitted to do so if it has a legitimate business purpose. Antrobus, the Data Protection Act is the law that will have been broken if thee was no legitimate business purpose.
...

I remain unconvinced that the DPA is of much relevance in this case. The DPA does not apply to information that is in the public domain.