BAI May Have Violated Privacy Laws By Viewing Civilian Criminal Records

Roh Hoi-chan, a Democratic Labor Party lawmaker, claimed yesterday that “the Board of Audit and Inspection (BAI) viewed criminal records of 8,961 civilians through the National Police Agency on June 24 this year. These people were reported by the National Tax Service as tax evaders. This can be considered a violation of the law.”

Rep. Roh said that while the National Assembly Legislation and Judiciary Committee were conducting an inspection of government offices, the BAI viewed criminal records under the pretext of “investigation of taxation on illegal inheritance/donation and unlawful unearned income.”

He added, “In March of this year, the BAI also viewed the criminal and credit records of 2,363 government officers who were in charge of accounting or licensing. All of these activities are illegal.”

He explained that based on the regulations regarding the statute of limitations on punishment and BAI audit rules, such reviews of criminal records of tax evading suspects done by the BAI can not be justified as fully legitimate activities.

Prior to the National Assembly’s inspection, Rep. Roh issued a press release saying, “It is a serious violation of human rights to indiscriminately view the criminal records of civilians and government employees. We will consider taking legal measures against the BAI chief at the party level.”

Responding to this accusation, Chun Yoon-cheol, chief of the BAI, offered a personal opinion, saying, “We are considering reducing [reviews of criminal records] as much as possible, since they involve some controversial issues including the confidentiality of personal information of government employees.”

According to Rep. Roh, the BAI made requests to the National Police Agency to view the criminal records of a total of 86,350 people from April 2001 to June of this year.

Myoung-Gun Lee gun43@donga.com