A/70/335 minority groups in positions of domination vis-à-vis the majority, or for electoral purposes. When ethical and human rights safeguards are not observed, disaggregation of data on religious or ethnic grounds can easily be instrumentalized. The misuse of data has been explained by a number of factors, including ideology, racism, nationalism, political and administrative opportunism, or professional zeal on the part of national statistical agencies or population registration administrative bodies in cooperation with power entities such as the security or military forces. 9 In that respect, the Special Rapporteur would like to underscore the importance of establishing independent data collection institutions with a mandate strongly grounded in international legal provisions and norms regulating such activities. 44. Moreover, ethnic statistics have been used in some instances as double -edged swords to stigmatize certain social groups. That is especially true for crime statistics. For example in Europe, Roma communities have often been overrepresented among the prison population incarcerated for criminal offences, 10 as is the case of African-Americans in the United States. Those statistics have been used to generate stereotypes and the perception that those population groups have a propensity towards crime because of cultural or certain innate characteristics. 45. If, therefore, the production of disaggregated data is essential for assessing and addressing discrimination, the establishment and implementation of human rights safeguards are prerequisites to collecting such data. C. Safeguards on sensitive data 46. The international human rights legal framework clearly provides that in order to collect and process personal data, due regard should be given to the right to privacy and the protection of data. Moreover, the process should be participatory and based on informed consent and self-identification. 1. Right to privacy and data protection 47. In its general comment No. 16 (1988), on the right to privacy, the Human Rights Committee stipulated, inter alia, that the gathering and holding of personal information on computers, data banks and other devices, whether by public authorities or private individuals or bodies, must be regulated by law and that States must take effective measures to ensure that information concerning a person’s private life does not reach the hands of persons who are not authorized by law to have it and it must never be used for purposes incompatible with the Covenant. In order to guarantee privacy everyone should have the right to ascertain whether, and if so what, personal data are stored in automatic data files and for what purposes. Everyone should also be able to ascertain who controls or may control their files and if they contain incorrect data or are contrary to the provisions of the law, they should have the right to request rectification or elimination. 48. According to the Principles and Recommendations for Population and Housing Censuses, ensuring confidentiality is crucial to achieving a successful census. Clear information has to be provided as to the purpose of collecting individual data, the sole aim of which should be the production of statistics, and __________________ 10 14/24 See, for example, European Commission against Racism and Intolerance, “‘Ethnic’ statistics and data protection in the Council of Europe countries” (2007). 15-14106