ICO issues reprimand to Greater Manchester Police over lost CCTV footage
The Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) has issued a reprimand to Greater Manchester Police (GMP) following the internal loss of two hours of custody suite CCTV footage from February 2021. The breach occurred when GMP failed to properly retain footage requested for extended storage beyond the standard 90-day period. The ICO found GMP breached the Data Protection Act 2018 by failing to implement appropriate technical measures to prevent data loss and failing to provide the data subject access within statutory timeframes. The investigation revealed the loss resulted from unclear internal responsibilities for quality checks and inadequate retention policies, rather than external breach or unauthorized sharing. GMP has since upgraded its surveillance infrastructure and implemented stricter retention procedures.