Privacy and the Bank of England

As part of our official functions, and in the public interest, we regulate and supervise banks, building societies, credit unions, insurers, financial market infrastructures and major investment firms (‘firms’). We have supervisory and disciplinary powers under the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (FSMA), Banking Act 2009 and under or as a result of regulations made under section 8 of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 that can involve the processing of personal data. These include assessing applications to perform senior management functions, assessing the ongoing security of firms’ soundness, assessing compliance with regulation or taking action in the event of non-compliance with regulation. 

The majority of information we receive is about the firm’s business, such as how it is structured and how it operates, but some personal data about the firm’s employees and clients may also occasionally be required (such as names, professional information, financial information, addresses, opinions and, in some cases, detailed information about identity and fitness to act in certain roles). We receive this information from individuals, from firms or from third parties (for example, the Financial Conduct Authority).

As part of our official functions, and in the public interest, we gather, analyse and publish data, which we use to inform our policy decisions and response to key economic events or crises and to supervise firms. 

Some data collected by the Bank for the purposes of statistical and market analysis, research and policy development that support these objectives include personal data. Certain regulatory returns and other sources include, for example, financial information, professional information, location information, information about civil proceedings, opinions, and information to monitor diversity, such as ethnicity/ nationality, sexual orientation, gender identity, socio-economic status and health/disability status.  In support of our mission, it is often necessary to have a broad range of information to enable us to effectively and efficiently meet our responsibilities.

These sources of information may be collected from the Financial Conduct Authority, the Office of National Statistics, firms we regulate, and other third parties, including Land Registry, credit reference agencies, commercial databases or publicly available sources.

More information about our research and statistical work is available on our Statistics pages.

Information we receive as part of our official functions as a central bank can include personal data. This processing is necessary for the performance of tasks in the public interest and in the exercise of official authority of the Bank in providing critical banking, payment and settlement services, acting in the financial marketplace to manage the Bank’s balance sheet and the reserves of the Bank and HM Treasury, as well as providing foreign exchange and other money market services for customers. 

The Bank collects personal data about you if the bank or building society with which you have a loan participates in the Sterling Monetary Framework, the Funding for Lending Scheme and/or the Term Funding Scheme and intends to use a loan portfolio which contains your loan as security against Bank funding. We collect personal data under the contractual arrangements we have in place with banks and building societies to assess the eligibility of the loan portfolio as security. We ask your bank or building society to remove the personal data as far as possible. This means that, where possible, we use identifiers in place of your personal data (and that the Bank cannot identify you based solely on the information your bank or building society has provided to us).

We ask for photo identification for all visitors. If you do not provide it, you will not be able to enter the premises.  CCTV also operates on-site.  It is necessary to do this for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority of the Bank, and to further our legitimate interests in securing our premises, assets, staff and visitors. 

If you visit the Bank of England Museum, you may receive separate privacy information.

We maintain networks of individuals across industries so that we can contact them to understand trends in the economy, and the impacts of regulatory decisions.  Some of our external contacts also speak at Bank events or act as advisers. Without maintaining these networks, we cannot perform tasks that are necessary in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority of the Bank.

The types of personal data we process for this will usually be limited to individuals’ name, business contact information and opinions. We usually receive these details direct from individuals we engage with, or from publicly available sources. We use the information to communicate, arrange events, issue surveys and promote our activities. More information on how we gather market intelligence is available on our Markets pages.

If you contact our public enquiries team, submit a request or complaint, sign up to specific mailing lists or choose to respond to consultations, we will receive personal data from you. We will process the personal data that you choose to give us. This usually includes your name and business or personal contact information. 

We will make it clear if we are asking for your consent to process your information. Otherwise, our basis for processing this data may be that it is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority of the Bank, that it is necessary for the legitimate interests of the Bank to engage with the public or that it is necessary for the Bank to perform a legal obligation. 

In line with regulated firms, we record telephone calls to our Markets Directorate including to assist audit and compliance. We also record telephone calls to our Public Enquiries Group (for training and monitoring purposes).

If you engage with us in relation to Banknotes, more information is available on our Banknotes pages.

If you contact us about a whistleblowing matter, more information is available on our Whistleblowing page. 

To request a copy of the personal data the Bank holds about you, please contact us at:

Information Access Team
Bank of England
Threadneedle Street
London, EC2R 8AH
Email: data-protection@bankofengland.co.uk

To contact us about any other individual rights, including requesting an amendment to, or deletion of, your personal data, please contact us at:

Privacy Team
Bank of England
Threadneedle Street
London, EC2R 8AH
Email: data-protection@bankofengland.co.uk

We will try to deal with your request as soon as practical. We will sometimes need to request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity and ensure your right to access the information (or to exercise any of your other rights). This is another appropriate security measure to ensure that personal information is not disclosed to any person who has no right to receive it.

For further information or if you wish to follow up your request or report a concern around how your personal data has been processed, you can contact the Bank’s Data Protection Officer. You can also report concerns to the Information Commissioner’s Office Opens in a new window, the regulatory authority for data protection in the UK.