2006 Code of Virginia § 2.2-3801 - Definitions

2.2-3801. Definitions.

As used in this chapter, unless the context requires a different meaning:

1. "Information system" means the total components and operations of arecord-keeping process, including information collected or managed by meansof computer networks and the Internet, whether automated or manual,containing personal information and the name, personal number, or otheridentifying particulars of a data subject.

2. "Personal information" means all information that describes, locates orindexes anything about an individual including his real or personal propertyholdings derived from tax returns, and his education, financial transactions,medical history, ancestry, religion, political ideology, criminal oremployment record, or that affords a basis for inferring personalcharacteristics, such as finger and voice prints, photographs, or things doneby or to such individual; and the record of his presence, registration, ormembership in an organization or activity, or admission to an institution."Personal information" shall not include routine information maintained forthe purpose of internal office administration whose use could not be such asto affect adversely any data subject nor does the term include real estateassessment information.

3. "Data subject" means an individual about whom personal information isindexed or may be located under his name, personal number, or otheridentifiable particulars, in an information system.

4. "Disseminate" means to release, transfer, or otherwise communicateinformation orally, in writing, or by electronic means.

5. "Purge" means to obliterate information completely from the transient,permanent, or archival records of an organization.

6. "Agency" means any agency, authority, board, department, division,commission, institution, bureau, or like governmental entity of theCommonwealth or of any unit of local government including counties, cities,towns, regional governments, and the departments thereof, and includesconstitutional officers, except as otherwise expressly provided by law."Agency" shall also include any entity, whether public or private, withwhich any of the foregoing has entered into a contractual relationship forthe operation of a system of personal information to accomplish an agencyfunction. Any such entity included in this definition by reason of acontractual relationship shall only be deemed an agency as relates toservices performed pursuant to that contractual relationship, provided thatif any such entity is a consumer reporting agency, it shall be deemed to havesatisfied all of the requirements of this chapter if it fully complies withthe requirements of the Federal Fair Credit Reporting Act as applicable toservices performed pursuant to such contractual relationship.

(1976, c. 597, 2.1-379; 1983, c. 372; 1999, c. 41; 2001, c. 844; 2003, c.272; 2006, c. 474.)