Summarised by Centrist
Inland Revenue (IRD) has been supplying social media platforms like Facebook and LinkedIn with anonymised taxpayer details for advertising campaigns.
Using a process called “hashing,” taxpayer data is encrypted, but critics argue this is insufficient protection. David Buckingham, an employment consultant, discovered the practice and called it “mass betrayal,” and a significant breach of trust. “No one agreed to any of this,” he told RNZ, pointing out that taxpayers have no control over how their information is used.
IRD generates around 30 to 50 audience lists per month, with up to 500,000 customers’ data used for ads.
Although the data is hashed, regulators in the US and Europe have flagged that this process can still allow for re-identification.
The US Federal Commission recently stated, “hashes aren’t ‘anonymous’ and can still be used to identify users.”
Despite these concerns, IRD stands by the security of its methods and compliance with privacy laws.
