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Privacy Act 2020

Miscellaneous provisions - Liability and offences

212: Offences

You could also call this:

“Things you can get in trouble for under this law”

You can get in trouble and have to pay up to $10,000 if you do certain things that go against this law. These things include:

If you stop the Commissioner or anyone else from doing their job under this law without a good reason. This means you can’t get in their way, make things hard for them, or fight against them when they’re trying to do what the law says they can do.

If you don’t do what the Commissioner or someone else working under this law tells you to do, unless you have a good reason not to.

If you lie to the Commissioner or anyone else who’s working under this law. This means you can’t give them false information or tell them things that aren’t true on purpose.

If you pretend to have power under this law when you don’t really have it.

If you trick an organisation by pretending to be someone else or acting like you have permission from someone else. You can’t do this to try and see, use, change, or get rid of that person’s private information.

If you destroy any document with personal information in it when you know someone has asked to see that information under subpart 1 of Part 4 of this law.

All of these things are against the law and can get you in big trouble.

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View the original legislation for this page at https://legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1986/0120/latest/link.aspx?id=LMS23701.

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Part 9 Miscellaneous provisions
Liability and offences

212Offences

  1. A person commits an offence against this Act and is liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding $10,000 if the person,—

  2. without reasonable excuse, obstructs, hinders, or resists the Commissioner or any other person in the exercise of their powers under this Act:
    1. without reasonable excuse, refuses or fails to comply with any lawful requirement of the Commissioner or any other person under this Act.

      1. A person commits an offence against this Act and is liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding $10,000 if the person—

      2. makes any statement or gives any information to the Commissioner or any other person exercising powers under this Act, knowing that the statement or information is false or misleading:
        1. represents directly or indirectly that they hold any authority under this Act when they do not hold that authority:
          1. misleads an agency by impersonating an individual, or falsely pretending to be an individual or to be acting under the authority of an individual, for the purpose of—
            1. obtaining access to that individual’s personal information:
              1. having that individual’s personal information used, altered, or destroyed:
              2. destroys any document containing personal information, knowing that a request has been made in respect of that information under subpart 1 of Part 4.

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