By Chris Wang / Staff reporter
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Huang Wei-cher (黃偉哲) yesterday said the Ministry of National Defense and other government agencies have leaked personal information about military personnel to a private human-resource firm.
Citing a report from an unnamed soldier, Huang said an inter-agency employment enhancement program leaked information about military personnel getting ready to leave the service and look for jobs without the troops’ permission, which would be a violation of the Personal Information Protection Act (個人資料保護法).
Each military unit undergoes an annual performance review, and troops had to submit personal information as part of a review out of fear that “they wouldn’t receive their service discharge orders,” Huang told a press conference.
“We all understand what happens in the military. You follow orders from your superior with no questions asked, especially when it involves the performance of your unit,” Huang said. “However, this practice is a breach of human rights because secrecy of personal information is protected by law.”
The employment-enhancement program was a collaboration of the defense ministry, the National Youth Commission, the Veterans Affairs Commission and the Council of Labor Affairs to assist soon-to-be-discharged -personnel in finding a job.
Yes123.com, which won the NT$2.1 million (US$72,725) bid from the Youth Commission this year to organize the program, used the information obtained from the defense ministry’s database to send spam to soldiers, Huang said.
The Personal Information Protection Act, which was amended in May last year, states that information collected by a government agency should “be used in accordance with the scope of its job functions.”
Colonel Yen Hua-hsing (嚴華興), from the ministry’s General Staff Headquarters, told the press conference that all military personnel participated in the program, which is in its 16th year, and submitted personal data of their own free will.
However, for the first time in 16 years, personnel were able to register for the job-hunting process through the military’s closed manpower system rather than having to fill in paperwork — a time-saving move aimed at helping the troops, said Shih Jian-chu (施建矗), director of the youth commission’s Second Department.
Given the questions over the legality of transferring personnel information from the military’s database to a commercial one, Yen agreed to consider excluding the participation rate from annual performance reviews of military units. Shih said he would re-examine the program’s content to ensure it is legal.