Vision Direct - SMS texts not meant for me with links to personal customer information

dinglebert

KatrinaWaves said:

You need to honestly have a good think about what identifiable means as a phone number on its own, which is what we’re talking about, is not 

I will respond to this and then stop.  Once again these are not my opinons they are the legal view of the ICO which states very clearly that a telephone number is identifable.   It does not matter a jot if you think differently the law is the law. I don't need to have a good think about it whatsoever.   You need to see the difference between a fact and an opinion.

Lets just for a second say it was your telephone number and the OP published it here.  How many people have your telephone number on their phones?   If they read the number they would be able to identify it was you.

KatrinaWaves

You are talking about a totally irrelevant situation. The OP isn’t posting anyone’s phone number, he is upset that someone else is texting his phone number.

if the OP posted my phone number totally randomly with no other context, and someone said ‘oh that’s my friend phone number’ what else is gonna happen?! Oh someone posted some numbers which happened to be your phone number? Same for date of birth? Which thousands of people share? 

You can continue spouting your job and that it’s the law but the fact is a random singular piece of information is not identifying. If someone recognised my phone number they only know it is me because they already have that information anyway. No other random person could use that to identify me, and as long as they weren’t saying ‘the person with x phone number is a sex offender’ or whatever else there is absolutely nothing wrong with posting a phone number at random 

Day_Of_The_Doris

KatrinaWaves said:

You can continue spouting your job and that it’s the law but the fact is a random singular piece of information is not identifying. 

A singular piece of information such as a telephone number can be classed as personal data if it can be used in conjunction with other data or resources to identify someone.
As an example. 
If I only had your phone number, I could then use that number and do a search on Google and if you had used that number on any online adverts for goods you were selling, it may well bring up further data about you.
This from the ICO explains it better:
https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guide-to-data-protection/guide-to-the-general-data-protection-regulation-gdpr/what-is-personal-data/can-we-identify-an-individual-indirectly/

Your starting point might be to look at what means are available to identify an individual and the extent to which these are readily available. For example, if searching a public register or reverse directory would enable you to identify an individual from an address or telephone number, and you are likely to use this resource for this purpose, you should consider that the address or telephone number data is capable of identifying an individual.

You should assume that you are not looking just at the means reasonably likely to be used by an ordinary person, but also by a determined person with a particular reason to want to identify individuals. For example, investigative journalists, estranged partners, stalkers, or industrial spies.

KatrinaWaves

But that is not what is happening. 

Try Googling a date of birth I’m sure you’ll deffo identify someone from that... 

IvanOpinion

Somebody has probably given a random number that just so happens to be your number to Vision Express.  So you get somebodies details - just delete them.  

I have the prime gmail address for my name but now have details of 14 different people with the same first initial and surname as me, who, at some point, have given out my email address (sometimes accidentally sometimes so that they can avoid spam).  For those that did it accidentally I have received payslips, insurance details, benefits details, invoices (including a couple of very interesting ones from, shall we say, purveyors of battery operated toys), quotes, private emails, guarantees etc.  I usually try to use the information to track down the real email address and forward the stuff on - most of the time met with apologies but on one occasion was met with abuse (I had some fun with that one).

Flight3287462

First world problems. 

Back in the real world we will just shrug and carry on.