Apply for a prohibited weapons (section 5) authority

Privacy notice – Section 5 authorisations

This notice lets you know how the Scottish Government will handle any personal information relating to your firearms authorisation under section 5 of the Firearms Act 1968.

1. In order to process your authorisation the Scottish Government Firearms Unit may collect and handle information about you and/or your organisation. We may use this information to contact you about your authorisation at any time.

2. We may ask Police Scotland to conduct enquiries on our behalf and may share your information with, and obtain information about you from, Police Scotland for this purpose.  This may include relevant information about your business/organisation, other firearms licences, your job role, your health and/or any prior criminal offences, accusations or ongoing criminal proceedings/investigations, as well as your: name; date of birth; home address and contact information.

3. Information will be used to reach a decision as to whether you should be granted authorisation or not. If information necessary to make this decision is not made available then your application will be refused and, if necessary, any existing authorisation may be revoked. 

4. If your application for authorisation is granted then the Scottish Government Firearms Unit will keep your information for a period of up 25 years after you stop being named on an authorisation. 

5.  In case of criminal allegations, at any time when requested we may share your current/former authorisation status with the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service and/or Police Scotland.

6. It is necessary for the Scottish Government to process this data in accordance with the Firearms Act 1968 (as amended). Our lawful basis for processing this data is:

• general data processing is carried out as a public task
• the processing of information relating to your health, (special category data), is carried out for reasons of substantial public interest
• the processing of criminal offence data (including information about any prior criminal offences, accusations or ongoing criminal proceedings/investigations) is carried out for reasons of substantial public interest

Rights

Under data protection legislation you have the following rights in relation to your personal data:

• the right to be informed about how we use your personal data, which is done through this privacy notice
• the right to access copies of your personal data
• the right to have inaccurate to a matter of fact, or incomplete, data rectified
• the rights to have data deleted, or to object to or restrict our use of your data in certain circumstances

These rights are not absolute and exemptions may be applied on a case-by-case basis.

7.  For further information please write to the Firearms Unit, Safer Communities Division, Scottish Government, Regent Road, EH1 3DG.  Alternatively please email firearms.enquiries@gov.scot.

If you wish to make a complaint about the handling of your personal data by the Scottish Government, please contact our Data Protection Officer: dataprotectionofficer@gov.scot.

Following this complaints process, you also have a right to make a formal complaint to the Information Commissioner’s Office, the UK’s independent authority on data protection: Make a complaint | ICO