ICO Specialist Knowledge Review
Leveson Inquiry · An Inquiry into the Culture, Practices and Ethics of the Press · Issued 29 November 2012 · Addressed to: Information Commissioner
Source — verbatim from the inquiry
●Inquiry recommendation
The Information Commissioner's Office should take the opportunity to review the availability to it of specialist legal and practical knowledge of the application of the data protection regime to the press, and to any extent necessary address it.
Leveson Inquiry, An Inquiry into the Culture, Practices and Ethics of the Press · 29 Nov 2012 Source PDF →
Published evidence summary
Publicly available evidence relating to this recommendation:
- No published evidence of a specific ICO review of its specialist legal and practical knowledge relating to press data protection, or any resulting changes to staffing or expertise, has been identified to March 2026.
Response — verbatim from government
●UK Government
The Prime Minister did not specifically address ICO operational recommendations in his 29 November 2012 statement. The Data Protection Act 2018 (Section 124) required the ICO to produce a data protection and journalism code of practice, which was published in 2023. The ICO has acted on several of these recommendations through its statutory functions. Source: https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/david-cameron-statement-in-response-to-the-leveson-inquiry-report
UK Government · 29 Nov 2012 Written response →
Evidence trail — what's actually happened since
- 27 Feb 2025 · ICO The ICO has developed specialist knowledge on data protection and the press, including through the development of the Journalism Code of Practice (2023) and its handling of press-related complaints and enforcement. View source → Confirmed Completed
Each entry above links to a primary source — gov.uk written statement, consultation response document, or inspection report. The Index does not characterise government intent; it tracks what has been published.
How this page is built
Source and Response are verbatim from primary documents. The Evidence trail records published activity since — written statements, consultation outcomes, inspection findings, parliamentary references. The Index does not paraphrase or characterise intent; it tracks what has been published. Where the evidence is the absence of action (a missed deadline, a slipped timetable), that absence is documented from primary sources rather than inferred.
This recommendation's data is verified periodically against primary sources. The Index is monitored for staleness weekly.