Council data blunder reveals email addresses

A council's data protection blunder that revealed hundreds of email addresses has been blamed on "human error".

Labour-led Stockton Council failed to use the Bcc function on a mass email about consultation events, with one recipient telling the Local Democracy Reporting Service about 250 addresses were viewable.

A spokesperson for the authority said the foul-up had been "referred to the council's data protection officer for further investigation".

The Information Commission's Office (ICO), which regulates data safety in the UK, said it had not yet heard from Stockton Council.

A spokesperson for the watchdog said: "Organisations must always notify the ICO within 72 hours of becoming aware of a personal data breach, unless it does not pose a risk to people's rights and freedoms.

"If an organisation decides that a breach doesn't need to be reported they should keep their own record of it and be able to explain why it wasn't reported if necessary."

Stockton said it had emailed "a number of people" about changes to consultation events on Monday, but did not say how many.

In a follow-up email that afternoon, the authority said the mistake was caused by "human error", claimed it was an "isolated" incident and offered "sincere and unreserved apologies".

The council claimed it was reviewing its procedures but gave no details, before telling recipients to delete the mail and not "reply all" themselves.

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