IRD privacy breaches a systemic failure

IRD has made multiple privacy breaches involving 6,300 people in the past year, showing there are serious systemic issues in the department, says Labour’s Revenue spokesperson Dr David Clark.

“One privacy breach is too many. For one department to have 32 breaches in a year involving 6,300 people is outrageous. Something terribly wrong is going on at IRD. Peter Dunne is taking his eye off the ball.

“Including the breaches at ACC and WINZ there are almost 16,000 Kiwis that we know of that have had their private details released to other people. That’s four out of every one thousand New Zealanders.

“There are over 5,700 people who had their privacy breached by IRD but haven’t been told. This Government doesn’t take our privacy seriously.

“They need to listen as New Zealanders are deeply concerned when news that their medical details, debt levels, finances, employment status and other deeply private information may have been released.

“It’s a basic duty of Government to protect our information. National is letting New Zealanders down.

“IRD is a shambles and Peter Dunne has had seven years in charge to fix it. The department still has around $7 billion of tax yet to collect and one million tax returns remain unprocessed.

“The biggest problem is the FIRST computer system which is 20 years old and not up to the job.

“Peter Dunne says it will be fixed over the next 10 years but hasn’t provided a cogent plan or proper timeline. That’s not good enough.

“The systems are falling over and New Zealanders are being seriously affected. We can’t wait ‘ten years or so’, the IRD must be upgraded as a priority,” says Dr Clark.