Morrisons Employee Data Breach – What Lessons Can Be Learned?

Morrisons recently hit the headlines in relation to its defence of a class action against it for breaching privacy and data protection laws.  Over 2000 of its employees are reportedly grouping together to sue the UK supermarket retailer in what the press is already referring to as the biggest claim yet in London's High Courts relating to a mass data breach.

The data leak was caused by an ex-employee, Andrew Skelton, a former internal auditor for the company, who released details of around 100,000 staff.  The data leaked included salaries, bank account details, national insurance numbers and dates of birth and employees claim that the leak has put them at risk of identity theft, bank account fraud and potential negative impact on credit ratings.  Mr Skelton was jailed for eight years in July for leaking these details to newspapers and websites, even though the details were online for less than 24 hours.  The Crown Prosecution had argued that Mr Skelton had harboured a