A person's identity record is rarely confined to themselves. The record of a birth names parents. The record of a marriage names a spouse. The record of a death names beneficiaries, executors, and surviving relatives. Each is, in form, a record of the named principal; in effect, it is a record of a family.

Subsequent records reinforce the connections. A property held jointly with a spouse is on both their titles. A guarantee given by a parent on a child's loan names both. A beneficial interest declared by a trustee names the beneficiary. Companies House filings name family members where they share a directorship.

The result is that the records of related people are tied together in ways that no single record discloses but that an aggregating reader can quickly assemble. A search on a person leads, naturally, to the records of their close relations. The privacy of one becomes, in part, contingent on the privacy of others.

For families with members in different states of public visibility (a private parent and an executive child, a quiet patriarch and a publicly known sibling, a discreet spouse and a campaigning partner) the linkages can produce unintended exposure. The visible relative carries the less visible one into a search by association.

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The desk reads family relationships in the record where they bear on the work. The reading is, in part, a recognition that a family's position is a single thing in the public record, even where the family treats its members as separate. The work proceeds accordingly.