safe and
productive lives
and enterprises
Data Protection Privacy Statement
Use of Drones during Investigation of Serious Incidents or Dangerous Occurrences
Who we are
The Authority has responsibility for ensuring that workers (employed and self-employed) and those affected by work activity are protected from work related injury and ill-health. We do this by enforcing occupational health and safety law, promoting accident prevention, serious incident and dangerous occurrence investigation and providing information and advice across all sectors.
The Authority is a Competent Authority for a number of chemical regulations including REACH (Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals) Regulation and Seveso II Directive. Our responsibility in this area is to protect human health (general public, consumers and workers) and the environment, to enhance competitiveness and innovation, and to ensure free movement of chemicals in the EU market.
Controller contact details
The Health and Safety Authority is the controller for the personal data it processes. You can contact the Health and Safety Authority in a number of ways, which are set out on the contact page of our website, www.hsa.ie
DPO contact details
In accordance with Article 37 of the GDPR, the Health and Safety Authority has appointed a Data Protection Officer. If you wish to contact our Data Protection Officer in relation to the processing of your personal data by the Health and Safety Authority, you can do so by emailing dpo@hsa.ie
Purpose of Processing By The Health and Safety Authority
The Health and Safety Authority processes personal data for a number of different purposes, which arise from its statutory powers, functions and duties and also services that are provided by the Authority including information services and the provision of e-learning courses.
The Health and Safety Authority’s statutory powers, functions and duties derive from various pieces of legislation pertaining to health, safety and welfare at work, chemical safety, dangerous goods transport and market surveillance.
There are a wide range of activities that fall under our remit including:
- Promotion of good standards of health and safety at work;
- Inspection of all workplaces and monitoring of compliance with health and safety laws;
- Investigation of serious accidents, causes of ill health and complaints;
- Developing and publishing codes of practice, guidance and information documents.
Purpose of processing personal data arising from the Use of Drones
During serious incident or dangerous occurrence investigations, images recorded using drones maybe required if the investigating inspector needs to obtain an aerial view of a large scale incident site, or to obtain an images of a site or building that has been deemed unsafe to enter, or to record evidence for the purposes of a criminal investigation which cannot be recorded using a handheld device, or other uses where it is necessary and proportionate to capture drone footage for the purposes of criminal investigations under the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work Act, 2005.
The legal basis for capturing drone footage is our legal duty to enforce health and safety legislation under the functions listed in Section 34 of the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work Act 2005. The Authority has powers to prosecute breaches of health and safety legislation and inspectors of the Authority have powers under Section64 of the Act to obtain images necessary for its investigations.
The Authority is listed as a competent body under the Chemicals Act 2008 and has a duty to enforce the legislation created under this Act. This Act gives powers to prosecute offences and powers to authorised inspectors to conduct examinations and take photographic images as part of investigations into breaches of legislation
What Personal Data Does is captured and processed when Drones are used?
Images captured by drones do not typically contain personal data of identifiable individuals. Procedures are in place to keep pedestrians outside the perimeter where drone footage is being captured however in built-up areas this may not be possible. The only personal data captured in drone footage is images of persons who may be unintentionally recorded in the background. The drones are not set-up to record close-up data; therefore any unintentional data capture of individuals should not be readable or allow for the identification of persons.
Who we share your data with?
Personal data collected by the Health and Safety Authority is held confidentially and is not shared by the Health and Safety Authority with any third parties, with the following exceptions:
- Where the sharing of the personal data is necessary for the performance by the Health and Safety Authority of its functions. This may arise, for example, in the context of incident or dangerous occurrence investigations, for the purposes of prosecuting offences, personal data may be shared with the DPP, Chief Sate Solicitors Office, An Garda Síochána, the Court Service, or as directed by a Coroner or other legal obligations.
- For the purpose of co-operation with other competent authorities or law enforcement agencies. In certain circumstances, the Health and Safety Authority must cooperate with and assist other competent authorities or law enforcement agencies. Data is only shared with other agencies where there is a lawful basis to do so and it is necessary and proportionate.
- For the purpose of legal proceedings. In the event that an investigation by the Authority is prosecuted any information, documents or submissions provided by an individual, may be made public in open court.
How Long Does The Health and Safety Authority Retain Personal Data?
The retention periods for personal data held by the Health and Safety Authority are based on the purpose for which the personal data is collected and processed and on legal and regulatory requirements to retain information for a specified period and on the relevant limitation periods for taking legal action. Detailed record management policy and procedures have been implemented which set out the retention period for our electronic and physical files. If you require more information on what the retention periods of data held about you, please contact our DPO at dpo@hsa.ie.
Your Data Protection Rights
Under data protection law, data subjects have certain rights.
Subject to certain restrictions, which are set out below, you can exercise these rights in relation to your personal data that is processed by the Health and Safety Authority.
The data subject rights are:
- The right to be informed about the processing of your personal data;
- The right to access your personal data;
- The right to rectification of your personal data;
- The right to erasure of your personal data;
- The right to object to processing of your personal data;
- The right to restrict processing of your personal data;
- Rights in relation to automated decision making, including profiling.
Restriction of data subject rights in certain circumstances
Article 23 of the GDPR allows for data subject rights to be restricted in certain circumstances. In addition, the 2018 Act contains certain provisions dealing with the restriction of rights of data subjects, in particular Sections 59, 60 and 61, which give further effect to the provisions of Article 23.
If you require further information in relation to your data subjects rights regarding your personal data that is held by the Health and Safety Authority, you can contact our Data Protection Officer (DPO) at dpo@hsa.ie.
Your Right To Complain
In the event that you wish to make a complaint about how your personal data is being processed by the Health and Safety Authority or how your complaint has been handled, you have the right to lodge a complaint directly with the Data Protection Commission at:
Data Protection Commission,
21 Fitzwilliam Square South
Dublin 2
D02 RD28
Ireland
+353 (057) 868 4800 / (076) 110 4800