Data Protection Protection?

Do we need protection from the Data Protection act?
Or from how universities interpret the implementation of it?

The Times Higher Education (15 May 2008) reports the case of an academic (an Economist) who got into trouble for confirming the details of a student's timetable to the student's mother. This seems a bit harsh especially as the general pattern of attendance for first year students (who rarely take optional modules) can often be inferred from publicly available information on web sites, which advertise the core and optional modules available for each year of study. Would the university had rather he was economical with the truth? At what point does all the private data (individual marks, attendance and other relevant information) leap into the public arena when students obtain final degree classifications, seek references and so forth and that data must to some extent be verifiable if it is to have value?


http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/