To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what audits his Department and its agencies have carried out in relation to personal data and IT equipment in each of the last 10 years. (176489)

The Northern Ireland Office has not performed any auditing of personal data in the last 10 years. In each of the last 10 years, my Department has maintained an asset register of IT equipment.

Internal Audit has not carried out specific audits of IT equipment. It has carried out the following audits of asset management which includes IT equipment within the scope.

NI Prison Service asset management audits in 2002-03 and in 2006-07

NIO core Department, an asset management audit was carried out in 2000-01

Audit logs of the following actions are maintained on our accredited systems.

System File access

Printing

Internet Access

Email

User Accounts

These audit logs are monitored on a weekly basis. However, this is one of the areas that will be investigated during the 2^nd phase of the data handling procedures in Government review.