Government’s appeal of fine over Public Services Card a 'waste of taxpayer’s money', says expert

The Data Protection Commission ordered the department to cease processing biometric data — capturing the physical or behavioral characteristics of a person — with the card within nine months unless it could establish a valid legal basis for its doing so. File photo: RollingNews.ie

A data protection expert has claimed the Government’s decision to take legal action against the Data Protection Commission over the Public Services Card will equate to a “long drawn-out waste of taxpayer’s money”.

Daragh O’Brien, a data strategist and managing director of data protection consultancy Castlebridge, said the Government’s challenge to the recent adverse decision by the commission regarding the public service card will in all likelihood end up before the Court of Justice of the EU, a process that will likely take several years and incur hundreds of thousands of euros in legal fees.