Data Protection Risks in Recruitment: Are You Collecting too much Candidate Data?
In today’s competitive talent market, recruitment teams often gather as much candidate information as possible — but in doing so, they may inadvertently breach UK data protection law.
Under the UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018, organisations must only collect personal data that is adequate, relevant, and limited to what is necessary. Yet it’s common for CVs to include sensitive information (e.g. health, ethnicity, family details) that is not required at early hiring stages.
Why this matters:
– Over-collection increases exposure in the event of a data breach.
– Unjustified processing of special category data can lead to ICO scrutiny.
– Transparency failures around what is collected and why may breach the fairness principle.
What to do:
– Review application forms and ensure only job-relevant data is requested.
– Strip out unnecessary information during CV screening.
– Train hiring managers to recognise and avoid processing special category data unless legally justified.
Hiring managers and risk teams should view candidate data as they would client data: with
- Purpose limitation,
- Retention discipline,
- Documented controls,
A privacy-aware recruitment process isn’t just best practice — it’s a compliance imperative.
