ICO Engage with Metropolitan Police
The Information Commissioner's Office should take immediate steps to engage with the Metropolitan Police on the preparation of a long-term strategy in relation to alleged media crime with a view to ensuring that the Office is well placed to fulfil any necessary role in this respect in the future, and in particular in the aftermath of Operations Weeting, Tuleta and Elveden.
- Operation Weeting, the Metropolitan Police investigation into phone hacking, resulted in convictions including that of Andy Coulson in June 2014 (R v Coulson and Others, Central Criminal Court, 2014).
- No published evidence of a formal long-term strategy between the ICO and Metropolitan Police on alleged media crime, as specifically recommended, has been identified to March 2026.
How was this evidence gathered?
Response
Accepted in Part
Response
Accepted in PartThe Prime Minister did not specifically address ICO operational recommendations in his 29 November 2012 statement. The Data Protection Act 2018 (Section 124) required the ICO to produce a data protection and journalism code of practice, which was published in 2023. The ICO has acted on several of these recommendations through its statutory functions. Source: https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/david-cameron-statement-in-response-to-the-leveson-inquiry-report
Published Evidence
Published assessments of progress from inspectorates, select committees, official progress reports, and other sources. Source type badge indicates whether each assessment is independent or government self-reported.
The ICO engaged with the Metropolitan Police on strategy following Operations Weeting, Tuleta and Elveden. These operations concluded and the ICO developed its approach to media crime enforcement.
View detailed findings
ICO-Metropolitan Police engagement on media crime strategy occurred, as recommended.