New Supreme Court Judgment On Compensation For Unauthorised Disclosure Of Personal Data

The Danish Supreme Court held that any unauthorised disclosure of personal data in connection with a case concerning access to files constitutes an actionable error that may result in the payment of compensation under Article 82(1) of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) provided that the data subject proves that the disclosure is likely to affect the data subject’s sense of self-respect and honour or otherwise have a negative impact on the data subject.

Background to the case

In April 2019, the Municipality of Hillerød received a request for access to files from a resident’s former spouse. When processing the request for access to files, an otherwise experienced case handler with the Municipality failed to notice a health detail about the mental health condition of the resident’s current spouse, appearing from an application for financial support for a stay at a residential secondary school, as well as information on the resident’s monthly disposable income, which