We’ve found them! Govt reinstates records previously missing from the Police National Computer

Around three weeks late — a fairly good result for anything to do with the UK government's Home Office IT — technology professionals have been able to recover all of the 413,000 records of evidence deleted from the Police National Computer (PNC) in January this year. Kit Malthouse, minister for crime and policing, said in a …

[Pascal Monett]

Well, the data was recovered

That is a good thing. It demonstrates that there is some functional backup system that can be relied on, with a bit of coaxing.

It is still to be hoped that a better backup procedure can be implemented, because restoring data in more than a quarter of a year is not exactly a stellar performance.

[james 68]

Re: Well, the data was recovered

Assuming that there was a backup. The time delay might suggest that there wasn't and they had to rely upon forensic prodding of the drives that contained the data.

[Yet Another Anonymous coward]

Re: Well, the data was recovered

>Assuming that there was a backup

Or they just re-arrested them

[Chris G]

Re: Well, the data was recovered

The back up was probably a pendrive somebody found down the back of a bus seat.

[RegGuy1]

Re: Well, the data was recovered

That's where my pendrive went.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Well, the data was recovered

That's probably why it took so much time - so many trains and buses to look through to find enough USB pendrives to reconstruct most of the data..

[A Non e-mouse]

Re: Well, the data was recovered

Unless your back up solution is written to understand your database application, restoring individual records in a database is usually not a trivial exercise. It's not like you're picking a couple of files from a filesystem backup. You're going to have all sorts of referential integrity pointers that you're going to have to re-setup as you re-insert the data back into the system.

In short: Databases can be big & complex beasts. You only truly value your local DBA once you f**k up and they pull you out of the hole you've dug yourself.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Well, the data was recovered

Or they don't value it at all, because "you did it before, so surely it'll be easier this time"

Yes, I've had too many calls along the lines of "I've deleted this thing that I shouldn't have deleted"

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Well, the data was recovered

But the DBA will surely get an printed certificate or maybe even Employee of the Month. What kind of value were you expecting?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok.

Please can they now find the files they lost when Theresa May was in charge?

[Anonymous Coward]

So... Now that we know they can be recovered...

How do we know they'll ever be deleted from now on?

(considering after 2 years the records are supposed to be removed, say for where you get arrested but released without charge..)

Anon because you can figure out how I'm aware of that specific example...

[IGotOut]

Re: So... Now that we know they can be recovered...

Yes, but now they all have new timestamps, so they can illegally hold onto information even longer.

[fedoraman]

DROP TABLE CRIMS

Note to all Forces - Do Not re-arrest Little Bobby Tables.

[PerlyKing]

Who, me?

There should be a good one in a little while :-)

[Anonymous Coward]

Have they checked the Guardian today.....

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/may/25/gchqs-mass-data-sharing-violated-right-to-privacy-court-rules

*

.....to see if the restored records are actually being held legally?

*

Just saying!

[Mike 137]

"the police had read all the recommendations and were responding to them"

They're not alone. "Reading the report and responding to it" is about as far as any organisation seems to go in the aftermath of a balls-up. The effectiveness of the response never gets scrutinised, and judging by the general record over the last couple of decades, it's typically pretty ineffectual.

[Wolfclaw]

Lord Hogan-Howe, that's OK then guaranteed an accurate, non-whitewashed above board investigation NOT !!

[Missing Semicolon]

Depends whose data

Pity they had no back-ups of all those boarding cards....

[Anonymous Coward]

It was Fujitsu wot dun it!

Good to see Fujitsu working to ensure genuine criminals are arrested and charged ... for a change.

[staringatclouds]

Manual insertion

“Over 99 per cent of the data deleted from the PNC was recovered within the previously announced timeline. The remaining records required manual insertion into the PNC ..."

As we all know this is a completely error free & accurate process :eyeroll:

I wonder who now has a record who didn't have one before & who did but hasn't now

Buttle/Tuttle anyone ?

[Sgt_Oddball]

Re: Manual insertion

Has anyone been watching the home Secretary's latest police raids? It wouldn't surprise me by this point if you need to sign in triplicate to acknowledge you've been arrested.

On a side note, does anyone know a good plumber?