The ICO exists to empower you through information.

 Purpose and lawful basis for processing

Our purpose for processing this information is to facilitate the grant.

The lawful basis we rely on to process your personal data is article 6(1)(e) of the UK GDPR, which allows us to process personal data when this is necessary to perform our public tasks as a regulator.

What we need

When individuals apply for a research grant under the ICO’s Grants Programme, they submit their information in an application form, give details of their proposal and outline the research’s potential cost.

Why we need it

Those who are awarded grants are asked to provide progress reports, a final report and a list of final expenses. Any personal information given in the application and during any research for which we have awarded a grant, is used only to review the grant application and the ongoing administration and management of any grants we award.

What we do with it

We may also publish information about projects on our own website, including the amount of grant awarded and the recipient of the grant.

Some information about grants awarded are also published on the Government grants register. The information that will be made public on the register includes the name of the grant programme (for us the ICO Grants Programme) and the funder’s name (the ICO), a description of the grant’s aims and objectives, the value and currency of the grant, the date it was awarded, and the name of the grant’s recipient and their recipient ID. More information on the Government grants register can be found here.

How long we keep it

For information about how long we hold personal data, see our retention schedule.

What are your rights?

As we process personal data in grant applications in our capacity as a regulator, you have the right to object to our processing of your personal data. There are legitimate reasons why we may refuse your objection, which depend on why we are processing it.

For more information on your rights, please see ‘Your rights as an individual’.

Do we use any data processors?

No – we do not use any processors for the above. But, as stated above, we do publish information on the Government grants register.