By Cat Norris. Last Updated 10th September 2024. Data breaches continue to make news, and cyber threats, along with various security breaches, are part of normal life now. What is the potential impact of a data breach on individuals involved? A data breach can cause enormous disruption and distress to the people it impacts. However, you could be compensated after discovering that your personal information has been compromised in a way that led to you being exploited or harmed in some way.
This guide will look at the potential consequences when others gain access to your personal data. We explore issues like stolen funds, identity theft and psychological harm. If sensitive information about you was mishandled, we also look at the actions you can take to prevent the issue from getting worse.
As you read this guide on the potential impact of data breach on individuals, please get in touch with any questions or queries. Our advisors can offer free information about data breach issues involving your personal or sensitive data. To connect, simply:
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Browse Our Guide
- What Is The Potential Impact Of A Data Breach On Individuals?
- What Actions Should You Take After A Data Breach?
- Read About How To Claim For Data Breaches
What Is The Potential Impact Of A Data Breach On Individuals?
Firstly, it’s useful to understand that personal data is defined as any detail that on its own (or when used alongside other details), might reveal a person’s identity. So this includes information ranging from basic contact details to much more confidential medical information, and biometric data.
The Data Protection Act 2018 and UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) are two laws that protect the data rights of the public. These laws explain how personal data should be legally processed by those who request it. Typically this is two groups called controllers and processors. The controller sets the reason for data collection and use whilst the processor may be appointed to work on their behalf to process it.
An independent watchdog called the Information Commissioners Office (ICO) enforces these data protection laws and can fine any organisation, public or private, that fails to meet the correct data protection standards.
Data breaches can happen either accidentally or deliberately. The general definition is any security incident that allows personal data to be accessed by unauthorised parties, stolen, duplicated, lost or destroyed wrongly. In the next sections, we look in detail at the consequences of data breach to the subject involved after data mishandling:
Negatively Impacting Your Credit Score
Data breach can also impact your credit score which is a three-digit score for how promptly you pay bills and service your debts. A damaged credit score can take a long time time to rebuild or repair once damaged. Furthermore, a weak score report can have a bearing on your future creditworthiness and negatively impact your ability to secure finance such as personal loans, car agreements and rent or mortgages.
Identity Theft
Identity theft can occur if criminals are able to access enough information about you to pretend to be you. They are skilled at connecting what may appear to be random details and snippets of personal information and use them to infiltrate further into a person’s identity. Once there, the criminal can start to syphon funds away or take out credit agreements in the name of others.
Psychological Harm
A very common consequence of a data breach is psychological harm. In many cases, a breach of personal data can feel very invasive, and this can cause severe psychological effects.
For example, if an abusive ex-partner were to gain access to your new address as a result of a breach, this can have very serious emotional consequences. A situation like this can cause heightened anxiety, and could potentially exacerbate existing mental health conditions like post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
Another example of the potential mental health impact of a data breach can include shame and embarrassment that lead to depression. For example, if you have a criminal record and this is revealed to your coworkers in a data breach, this could cause an episode of severe depression.
Unfortunately, mental health issues caused by data breaches can also lead to significant financial effects. For example, paying for private counselling and therapy to overcome the effects of the episode, or the cost of relocating to a new home.
Having To Move Address
If confidential information has been compromised, there can be instances where the person needs to move address. An example would be a violent individual who discovered the whereabouts of their estranged partner when a letter containing personal information was sent to the wrong address. The ex-partner could harass and intimidate the person to the point where they had to move from their home.
Threats from the ex-partner such as this can also create enormous emotional disruption to the person’s life and that of any dependents. In addition to this, there are the huge financial costs of relocating home (and schools for children) creating a significant added burden.
What Actions Should You Take After A Data Breach?
You may suspect that your data is breached yourself. Or perhaps an organisation alerted you to a data security incident involving your sensitive data with a notification letter. If so, there are some practical steps that you can take to minimise the harm and restore data security:
- Firstly, confirm that your online bank accounts or profiles have actually suffered unauthorised activity. Look out for issues like being unable to log in normally. Or if there have been log-in attempts from unusual locations and times. You can seek advice from the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) for help recovering a hacked account.
- Raise a concern with the organisation but only through their official website or social media links. Cybercriminals could have replicated websites and social media pages of an organisation to harvest personal data.
- Be more aware of any increases in cold calls or spam emails, particularly official-sounding requests to alter passwords or action needed for ‘missed deliveries’. Don’t click on anything unfamiliar or unusual that requires you to act ‘straight away’. Legitimate organisations rarely if ever need to make these sorts of requests.
- Change passwords that have been part of the breach, as well as any authentication steps.
With all this in mind, you may find the support of a No Win No Fee data breach solicitor helpful. We work closely with a panel of solicitors who have been successfully getting compensation for the distress and financial harm victims of data breach experience for many years. Find out more when you:
- Call the team on 0208 050 3051
- Use the live discussion portal at the bottom of the screen.
- Or, you can contact us online to start a conversation.
Read About How To Claim For Data Breaches
In addition to this guide about the impact of a data breach on individuals, these other articles may help:
- Here, we look at how a No Win No Fee data breach solicitor could help.
- Also, read about compensation for the destruction of personal data after a breach occurs.
- Furthermore, this guide looks at how human error could lead to a data breach.
External help:
- Here are some data breach statistics from the Cyber Security Breaches Survey 2024.
- Also, more details on Data Protection from GOV.UK.
- Lastly, some top tips to stay safe online are available to read here.
We value your interest in our guide about the potential impact of data breach on individuals. For free advice on how a No Win No Fee solicitor can help after data breaches happen, speak to our dedicated team of advisors. Reach them on the contact options above.
