Legal & ethical consideration

Confidentiality of information
The data protection act (DPA) was made a law in 1998, the act protects peoples rights from
the data that is stored about them online. The act stops companies from selling or making
your information public, this stops your information from being spread around and keeps it
safe. You will need to be aware of this as GAP Travel will store peoples information and
should know that it needs to be kept confidential and cant be put online. The Act covers
online data and any files that are stored that are personal. The act has a separate definition
for sensitive personal data this explains what data should be kept confidential, i.e. racial or
ethnic origin, political opinions, religious beliefs, trade union activities, physical or mental
health, sexual life, or details of criminal offences. A data breach is when data has been
viewed that should have been kept confidential.
Privacy laws
These refer to that regulate, store and use of personal information that the government or
any private organizations can collect. The privacy laws are considered the rights of a persons
privacy. GAP Travel will need to think about this when collecting information about people
they are working with, if the information they have isnt public then they must keep it
private and keep it confidential or it would be breach of data.
Decency laws
Decency laws are the exposing purposely of the human body, most cases of this are nudity. A
non-sexual display of nudity can be seen as indecent exposure whereas sexual acts or
exposure are considered gross indecency which is usually more serious and can be
considered a criminal offence, GAP Travel will need to know this when keeping a professional
standard and no employees should expose themselves.
Libel laws
libel laws are linked with slander, a libel case is caused when someone makes a false
statement about another person without evidence that causes harm to the person or the
persons reputation. Written insults or defamation is called libel where as spoken
defamation is called slander, these are not criminal cases but the person that is defamed
can use the person that did it to them as it is a civil wrong. The claim that is said must be
false for it to be defamation because if it is true it is just a true statement and the reputation
of the person shouldnt be affected as the statement would be true.

When publishing anything you need to make sure it is unbiased and accurate, you must take
into consideration peoples:
 Gender (if they are male, female or other)
Race i.e. if they are white, Hispanic, black, Asian etc.
Religion (Muslim, Christian, Jewish etc.)
Sexuality (heterosexual or homosexual)
Age
Class (working class or middle class)
When using the media all these apply to you, this is to stop racism and discrimination,
breaking any of these online is still considered breaking the law and being anonymous wont
stop you from this. When GAP Travel use social media, they need to be careful in what they
post or say to people, as if they say something bad about someone it could cause someone
to sue the company and make you lose out and a lot of money. If you are posing a video,
picture or sound clip of someone you must make sure you have their permission before
posting or uploading the picture. Make sure you dont post anything offensive or could harm
their reputation as this is libel. Make sure you dont verbally say something that could offend
someone and harm their reputation, this is slander.
I will need to take this into consideration when designing the multimedia project, I need to
make sure my wording and images dont harm anyone. Ill get the permission from people if
they are in any pictures I use. Any data I acquire will be kept confidential if it is personal and
I will not illegally find out peoples personal data.
OFCOM
Ofcom (the office of communications) is a government approved system that regulates
broadcasting, telecommunications and postal
industries in the UK. They have powers in
television, telecoms, radio and postal sectors. They
protect the public from harmful or offensive
material, this includes the broadcasting of things
inappropriate for children between 5:30 am and 9:00
pm, they have a pin protected service which allows
people without children or people that are trying to
view something unsuitable for children to view the
content that is banned for childrens safety.
ASA
ASA (advertising standards authority) is an organisation that regulates advertising in the UK,
ASA is not funded by the government but it is
funded by the advertising industry. Its role is to
regulate the advertisements, sales and
promotions in the UK. They investigate
complaints made about an ad or any other
content they regulate, they stop advertising
companies from misleading the public by inaccuracy or exaggeration on a marketing
campaign. This protects the public from advertisers trying to mislead you into buying the
project.
BIMA
The British Interactive Media Association is an association that helps individuals or
organisations produce high quality, creative media solutions