Revenge porn mentioning Onlyfans - 756/2021

Request:

I am requesting the number of reports of revenge porn each year over the last 2 tax years, with reports that mention the use of OnlyFans. 

 

Clarification.

The applicant is referring crimes that took place in the tax years 2019/2020 and 2020/2021.

 

Response:

 

Section 1 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 places two duties on public authorities. Unless exemptions apply, the first duty at Section 1(1)(a) is to confirm or deny whether the information specified in a request is held. The second duty at Section 1(1)(b) is to disclose information that has been confirmed as being held.

 

Dyfed-Powys Police are unable to confirm or not whether we hold information relevant to your request, since we consider that the Section 12(2) exemption the Cost of Compliance exceeds the Appropriate Limit applies to it.

 

Where exemptions are relied upon Section 17 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 requires Dyfed-Powys Police, when refusing to provide such information (because the information is exempt) to provide you the applicant with a notice which: (a) states that fact, (b) specifies the exemption in question and (c) states (if that would not otherwise be apparent) why the exemption applies.

 

Section 12(2) – The cost of compliance exceeds the Appropriate Limit

 

Section 12(2) states: “…Subsection (1) does not exempt the public authority from its obligation to comply with paragraph (a) of section 1(1) unless the estimated cost of complying with that paragraph alone would exceed the appropriate limit.”

 

The cost of providing you with the information requested in respect of your request is above the amount to which we are legally required to respond i.e. the cost of locating and retrieving the information exceeds the “appropriate level” as stated in the Freedom of Information (Fees and Appropriate Limit) Regulations 2004. It is estimated that it would exceed 18 hours (i.e. minimum of 497.50 hours) to comply with this part of your request. The regulations can be located @

 

www.legislation.hmso.gov.uk/si/si2004/20043244.htm

 

The Freedom of Information Unit has been advised by the relevant department that in order to establish what information, if any, is recorded in relation to the whole request would exceed the appropriate time limit i.e. 18 hours. This is due to the fact that a search has been conducted including the term “OnlyFans” with a zero result. In order to establish whether or not there is any information recorded which is relevant to the request would require an individual interrogation of all possible relevant crimes recorded during the specified timeframe.

It has been established that there is a total of 2,985 crimes that would require individual interrogation and it has been estimated that it would take a minimum of 10 minutes to research each individual record. The relevant time estimate is detailed below:

 

2019/2020:      1,179 crimes x 10 minutes per record = 196.50 hours

2020/2021:      1,806 crimes x 10 minutes per record = 301.00 hours

 

• Therefore total time estimate to the whole request = 497.50 hours

 

 In accordance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000, this letter acts as a Refusal Notice for the WHOLE of this request under Section 17(5) A public authority which, in relation to any request for information, is relying on a claim that section 12 or section 14 applies must, within the time for complying with section 1(1), give the applicant a notice stating that fact. You may wish to refine and resubmit your request so that it reduces the time shown above to fall within the 18 hours. Should you require any further advice in relation to this matter please don’t hesitate to contact me.

 

Please also be advised that should the request be refined, it does not remove the Force’s right to cite exemptions if relevant.