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Two former employees were fined by the ICO for misusing personal information

Two former employees who worked at a UK based claims management company illegally obtained information from a car hire company and then used this information to blag calls to an insurance company to illegally obtain personal information of drivers.

They did this in order to try and sell this personal information to solicitors. We ourselves have never bought claims, and never will!

The information included policy holders information and their recent and/or historic road traffic accidents. Within that information, the policy holders’ names, addresses, and contact details would likely have been accessed too.
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November of 2016 saw the largest number of data breach incidents

2016 was a big year for changes.

From Brexit and Trump, to a wave of celebrity legends departing our lives, 2016 was one heck of a bumpy road; and we saw some of the most notable data breaches in history around the world. With the online world ever advancing, we can’t seem to keep up. Cyber hackers have been constantly coming up with new methods to break down security walls to wreak havoc and fear, and leaks are almost becoming a norm.
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Hundreds of NHS patients may have suffered serious harm from 500,000 data breaches

Although we value and treasure our National Health Service – who for the most part do a wonderful job of looking after us – they are responsible for significant amounts of data breaches. In fact, they’re way ahead when compared to everyone else, and it’s a real issue because the information they secure for us is often very sensitive and personal.

Unfortunately, we have to report yet another serious data breach story involving the NHS.

It has been revealed that the NHS has lost more than 500,000 pieces of patient information between 2011 and 2016. This may have led to hundreds of NHS patients suffering serious harm as a result.
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Trio of data thieves have been prosecuted and fined over £400,000

A gang of three data thieves were charged and prosecuted by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) earlier this year for unlawfully obtaining personal data at their employment, and then selling it onto claim management companies.

Andrew Minty, Jamie Leong and Michelle Craddock – all employees of Enterprise-Rent-A-Car – conspired to steal customer information so they could sell on the personal information to third party claims management companies. They sold the information on the basis that the claims management company would then use the personal data and information to make nuisance calls to the individuals.
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Two people sentenced for 12 months after leaking confidential information

If you thought breaching confidential information would earn you a slap on the wrist and nothing more, you thought wrong.

Recently, two people from a claims management company and an insurance company were jailed for 12 months following a serious data breach. Data is a sensitive and valuable commodity, and the punishments for failing to protect information should be strict.
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Many United States Special Operations Command staff had their personal information leaked in an admin error.

Around 11 GB of personal data belonging to US Special Operations Command Staff was accidentally leaked by an admin error recently.

The names, locations, salaries and the US version of National Insurance numbers were leaked in this embarrassing mistake that could literally be a serious issue of national security.
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Tens of millions of pounds of investment portfolios were revealed in the Ameriprise data leak

Not all data breaches stem from hacking; sometimes it just leaks out.

An employee working at financial planning giant Ameriprise unintentionally exposed personal information of customers, which included hundreds of investment portfolios worth tens of millions of pounds.

So you can say this is a big leak.
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Police involved after a sensitive data leak occurred at Isle of Man’s Department of Health and Social Care

Recently, the self-governed state of the Isle of Man reported that one of their government departments had been subject to a sensitive data leak.

A recording device was stolen from a secured room at the Department of Health and Social Care. The recording device was used to record sensitive meetings with children and families. The department have said that the recording was not often used and only ever done at the request of the service user.
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Rise of the fake news and its implications from a data perspective

“Banksy’s identity revealed!”

“Facebook now requires a monthly user fee.”

“Bath salts create zombies.”

Chances are, you’ve probably seen these ‘news’ headlines all over social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter. These shocking revelations prompted millions of social media users to click on the links to find out more, and then they were sharing the links to warn friends and family.

However, these incredible and shocking ‘news’ articles were produced for that exact effect; rather than the production of real journalism. And it can cause problems for those who open links and share them.
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RSPCA was given a fine by the ICO for secretly screening their donors by using wealth management services.

Very recently, the Information Commissioners Office (ICO) has handed out penalty fines to two well-known charities for secretly screening their donors’ personal information, and then using an external wealth management company to analyse the data to find the most generous donors and work out who would be most likely to give again.

With this effective but illegal method, the charities then used direct marketing communications to ask targeted donors to make more donations. This is, however, a breach, of data protection legislation.
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