Administration at Landspítali University Hospital is looking into whether personal information was leaked from the hospital to the Directorate of Immigration, RÚV reports. A Vietnamese couple is considering filing charges for a severe breach of confidentiality and personal privacy.
Van Hao Do and Thi Thuy Nguyen live in Iceland. He has lived in Iceland since early childhood and has permanent residence, but she moved here in 2013. They got married in December that year and Thi Thuy gave birth to their baby last year. Her residence permit expired in April of last year. Fréttablaðið covered the story extensively last week.
The Directorate of Immigration denied Thi Thuy permanent residence, claiming the marriage was one of convenience. That conclusion was based on a video from the wedding, showing, the Directorate claims, the bride not feeling well. In addition, information was provided by Landspítali, saying the wife was very young and childish, and her husband timid.
That information, according to Thi Thuy’s lawyer Björg Valgeirsdóttir, was provided by phone.
“This,” she says, “is dead serious, because such a leak is not supposed to take place in public administration, let alone at Landspítali. Its only reporting duty is toward the Child Protection Agency, if there is suspicion that something is not as it should be. So it seems the sharing of information by Landspítali with the Directorate of Immigration was illegal in every respect. Therefore, the way I see it, the Directorate of Immigration had no right to base its decision on that information―not to mention forward it in a letter to the Greater Reykjavík Police.”
Björg finds it likely the information was leaked when the baby was born. She says the couple denies having gotten married in order to obtain permanent residence. “They are a young couple in love, who have a young child together,” she claims.
