State institute found to be illegally collecting personal medical data – Radio Prague
The Office for Personal Data Protection says it has never encountered such a large-scale database of illegally collected personal data: information from 200,000 drug prescriptions a day for the last six months showing who uses what kind of medicine. And the body collecting it? The State Institute for Drug Control.
Personal information was being taken from written prescriptions, not from electronic prescriptions at all; it was being collected in pharmacies and processed by the State Institute for Drug Control beyond the scope of what it was authorised to do by law; the Institute was actually demanding that pharmacies send this information.
This information that was collected attests to the medical conditions of all of the individuals who picked up medicines from a pharmacy. That kind of material could be used for blackmail, but of course it also serves marketing purposes extremely well.
The State Institute for Drug Control believes it was gathering its data legally, in the same way insurance companies do, and another association of pharmacy owners involved in the situation claims that it was the data protection office itself that approved the practice in the first place.