This guide explains how to make a data breach claim after your personal data was involved in a breach. Two pieces of legislation called the Data Protection Act 2018 (DPA) and the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) are in place to protect the personal data of UK residents.
How to make a data breach claim
Data rights for UK residents are upheld by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), which can fine any organisation that fails to apply UK GDPR law. But they cannot pay individual compensation, nor can they handle your claim.
To find out more about claiming right now, you can speak to our team for a free assessment:
- Simply call on 0208 050 3051
- Contact us online to get started
- Use the live chat option below
Choose A Section
- How To Make A Data Breach Claim
- Potential Evidence That Could Help You Make A Data Protection Breach Claim
- When Are You Eligible To Seek Data Breach Compensation?
- Data Breach Compensation Calculator – What Could You Receive?
- Claim Using Our Panel Of Data Breach Solicitors On A No Win No Fee Basis
- Read More About Making A Data Breach Claim
How To Make A Data Breach Claim
A personal data breach can cause serious financial and psychological injury to the individuals they impact. The DPA and UK GDPR legislation defines personal data as any piece of information that, when used alone or alongside other data, could reveal or infer your identity.
If this data is compromised in a security incident that affects its availability, security, or confidentiality, then it has been affected by a personal data breach. A claim could be made if the breach goes on to cause financial and psychological injury to the data subject. However, in order for your claim to be eligible, you must be able to prove that:
- The controller and processor caused the breach through wrongful conduct. A data controller makes the decisions regarding your personal data, and a processor processes it by following the controller’s instructions
- This breach involved your personal data
- You directly suffered financial or psychological distress because of the data breach.
To learn more about whether you could be eligible to claim, get in touch with our team today.
Potential Evidence That Could Help You Make A Data Protection Breach Claim
Supporting evidence is an essential part of how to make a data breach claim. Evidence can help strengthen your claim by proving who is liable for the breach and illustrating the harm you have suffered. Some examples of evidence that could help include:
- Correspondence from the organisation relating to the data breach incident
- Medical reports or records that illustrate how the breach has affected your mental health
- Bills, receipts and invoices that prove financial losses were caused by the breach
Our advisors can assist with collecting evidence and could help you put together a much stronger argument for compensation after a data breach. Call or email to learn more.
When Are You Eligible To Seek Data Breach Compensation?
With the core criteria in place, below are some instances that could give rise to a data security incident and breach:
- A bank data breach could occur if an employee were to send your bank statement to the wrong postal address
- A GP data breach could occur if a doctor or nurse were to verbally disclose information from your medical records regarding your medical conditions with an unauthorised party
- An email data breach could occur if your university were to send your disciplinary records to the wrong email address
Not all data breach security incidents are immediately the fault of the organisation. Speak with our advisors for more advice on how to make a data breach claim.
Data Breach Compensation Calculator – What Could You Receive?
Two main areas of compensation may apply after a personal data breach. Non-material damage compensation looks at psychiatric injury, and offers compensation for distress and other harm to your mental health. and is an opportunity for a solicitor or lawyer to refer to a document called the Judicial College Guidelines (JCG). This text provides guideline settlement amounts in order to help legal professionals value claims. You can find some excerpts below, but please note that these are not guarantees:
| Mental Health Condition | Award Bracket | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Mental Injury | Severe £54,830 - £115,730 | All areas of the person's life are impacted by severe symptoms, and the prognosis is poor. |
| Mental Injury | Moderately Severe £19,070 - £54,830 | Similar issues as above and still a long-standing illness but with a better prognosis. |
| Mental Injury | Moderate £5,860 - £19,070 | Symptoms that are initially serious but show an improvement by the time the case may be heard at trial. |
| Mental Injury | Less Severe £1,540 - £5,860 | These brackets assess the length of time affected by symptoms, as well as how these symptoms affect your day to day life. |
| PTSD | Severe £59,860 - £100,670 | Permanent trauma impacts that seriously reduce the person's quality of life. |
| PTSD | Moderately Severe £23,150 - £59,860 | Similar levels of harm to those above but a better prognosis after professional counselling. |
| PTSD | Moderate - £8,180 - £23,150 | A good recovery overall, leaving manageable persisting issues. |
| PTSD | Less Severe £3,950 -£8,180 | A virtually full recovery within 1 - 2 years and only minor issues persisting beyond this. |
In addition to this, material damage compensation covers the financial aspects of the breach. This can involve illegal purchases on credit cards or theft from bank accounts.
Adequate evidence can see these amounts included as part of a claim for compensation. Our team can explain more if you choose to get in touch.
Claim Using Our Panel Of Data Breach Solicitors On A No Win No Fee Basis
Should you decide to launch a claim after a data breach, a No Win No Fee solicitor from our panel offering a Conditional Fee Agreement (CFA) could help. Contracts such as this typically require no upfront fees to hire the solicitors or any as the case develops.
A success fee, which is capped by legislation, is only due if the claim is a success. It is usually a pre-stated percentage deducted after the compensation is awarded. No fees are owed to the data breach solicitor for their work if the claim is unsuccessful.
Get in touch for free to see if our advisors could connect you with a data breach solicitor from our panel:
- Simply call for free on 0208 050 3051
- Contact us online
- Use the live chat option below.
Read More About Making A Data Breach Claim
Other articles on the data breach claims process from our website are below:
- Reporting a UK GDPR data breach
- How much compensation you could get for a data breach?
- Accidental destruction of personal data
The resources below offer more help:
Thank you for reading our guide on how to make a data breach claim.
Writer Jeff Walker
Publisher Cat Harley
