Information Law

Book excerpt: Library, information and knowledge professionals are often at the front line of managing and monitoring their organisation’s legal compliance and have roles and responsibilities in both complying with the law and taking advantage of its provisions. To do their jobs effectively, they need not only to understand the law, but also to develop the skills, confidence and organisational policy frameworks to apply the law’s principles to their context of use. They need the knowledge and skills to help them decide what is acceptable and to develop appropriate risk aware approaches when things are not clear-cut. Information Law: Compliance for librarians, information professionals and knowledge managers provides an overview of important information law issues along with tools and guidance to help readers establish a framework so that their organisation can both comply with its legal responsibilities and support a suitably risk aware environment which optimises access and use. Based on the authors’ many years in professional practice and on their proven ‘Compliance Methodology’, it will help readers understand the legal issues that are central to the information they hold or that they wish to access.