KILO
eDelivery Group
3rd Floor Clive House
70 Petty France
London SW1H 9EX
T 020 7189 2432
F
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www.justice.gov.uk
Mr Poultney
Our Ref: 60306 / 03 August 2009
Dear Mr Poultney
Request for information
Thank you for your email of 06 July 2009, in which you requested the following information from the Ministry of Justice (MoJ):
Please send me a list of the public facing IP addresses used by the OLSO (Office of the Legal Services Ombudsman).
Please include a FULL list of addresses for any Proxy or Gateway (or similar) Servers that staff at the OLSO use to access the Internet.
For each IP address you list please indicate.
1. If the address is used EXCLUSIVELY by OLSO?
2. If the address is shared with other Government Offices, please list those Offices?
If you cannot answer question 2 please forward this request to the Office which CAN or, at very least, tell me which Office holds this information."
Your request has been passed to me because I have responsibility for answering requests which relate to Information and Communications Technology in the Department, and has been handled under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA).
I can confirm that the department holds some of the information you are seeking.
The information on the public facing IP addresses, and addresses for Proxy or Gateway (or similar) servers used by the OLSO is included in the response to a parliamentary question asked by Stephen O’Brien, MP on 15 December 2008, which notes the two IP addresses used across the Ministry of Justice’s internal office IT system. This response also provides the answer to 1, indicating that neither IP address is used exclusively by OLSO. Please see the following Hansard link:
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200809/cmhansrd/cm081215/text/81215w0035.htm#0812165000763
As this information is already in the public domain it is exempt by virtue of s21 of the FOIA 2000 (information accessible to applicant by other means).
Following investigations into question 2 I can confirm the information is not held by the MoJ, as the department does not hold a list of all Government Offices sharing these IP addresses.
However, outside the scope of the Act I can confirm that the Government Secure Intranet, (mentioned above in the response to the parliamentary question) is an accredited network that enables over 200 Government Departments and agencies to communicate securely with other connected Government organisations. In order to meet the arrangements for connection to the GSI, Departments and agencies must give assurance that they meet relevant security policies and have external access controls in place (see Hansard: http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200809/cmhansrd/cm090323/text/90323w0027.htm#09032341001280).
In addition, please find below a list of departments and offices that have confirmed in parliamentary questions that they share these addresses. Please note, this is not an exhaustive list and as mentioned there are 200 Departments and agencies which use the GSI network.
The Duchy of Lancaster
The Foreign and Commonwealth Office
The Cabinet Office
The Solicitor-General
The Department for Culture, Media and Sport
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
The Department for Energy and Climate Change
The Northern Ireland Office
The Ministry of Defence
The Department for International Development
The Department for Transport
The Department for Work and Pensions
The Department for Children, Schools and Families
The Government Equalities Office
HM Treasury
The Leader of the House
The Scotland Office
I hope you find this information helpful
As part of our obligations under the FOIA, the Ministry of Justice has an independent review process. If you are dissatisfied with this decision, you may write to request an internal review. The internal review will be carried out by someone who did not make the original decision, and they will re-assess how the Department handled the original request.
If you wish to request an internal review, please write or send an email to the Data Access and Compliance Unit within two months of the date of this letter, at the following address:
Data Access and Compliance Unit
Information Directorate
Ministry of Justice
6th Floor, Zone B
Post point 6.23
102 Petty France
London
SW1H 9AJ
e-mail:
If you remain dissatisfied after an internal review decision, you have the right to apply to the Information Commissioner’s Office under Section 50 of the FOIA. You can contact the Information Commissioner’s Office at the following address:
Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF
Internet: https://www.ico.gov.uk/Global/contact_us.aspx
Yours sincerely
Stuart Cole