The subject of data protection has, once again, been visited by the England and Wales Court of Appeal. At the end of last week the Court (Gross LJ, McFarlane LJ and Coulson LJ) gave its judgment in an appeal brought by the Secretary of State for the Home Department and the Home Office against a decision of the England and Wales High Court in which it was found liable to three members of a family following a data breach.
The Factual Background
The facts as found proved by the court at first instance are more fully set out in the judgment of Mitting J ([2016] EWHC 2217 (QB)), but they can be summarised for the purposes of this blog post in the following way. The case concerns three members of a family TLT, TLU and TLV. TLT and TLU are married (but have different surnames) and TLU is the teenage son of TLT (sharing the same surname). In 2010 the family lawfully arrived in the United Kingdom. They claimed asylum. They were also jointed by an older child who was, in 2010, 17 years of age. Upon turning 18, he applied for asylum in his own right. His application fro asylum was rejected and he was returned to Iran in 2012. TLT and TLU heard from relatives in Iran that upon his return to Iran their son had been detained and tortured and subsequently released after paying a bribe.
On 15th October 2013 the Home Office suffered a data breach when it accidently published more information than it had intended to concerning the family return process. It had intended to publish the statistics contained in the first sheet of a spreadsheet, but not the underlying data that was contained in a second sheet. The error was discovered on 28th October 2013 and the spreadsheet was immediately removed from the internet. It was discovered that by the time the spreadsheet was removed at least one unknown individual had downloaded and saved the spreadsheet.
In November 2014 a person who had downloaded the page and the spreadsheet from the UK Border Agency’s website uploaded the spreadsheet onto a US website; this was later removed on 18 December 2013.
The personal data of TLT was included within the spreadsheet; in particular it included both his forename and surname, his nationality (Iranian), his date of birth and age. It also noted that “assisted return” was being pursued and stated that the removal case type was “Family with Children – Voluntary”. It further acknowledged that asylum had been claimed.
In March 2014, TLU received some communications from a family member in Iran. These communications advised that the Iranian authorities had detained another member of TLU’s family and questioned them about “you”. It was said that the authorities in Iran claimed to have documentation showing that TLT and his family had claimed asylum.
The issues on appeal
There were three issues on appeal:
- Did the spreadsheet in question contain the private and/or confidential information?
- Did the spreadsheet contain personal data of which TLU and TLV were the data subjects?
- Even if the information in the spreadsheet did not contain the personal data of TLU and TLV, are they entitled to damages for the distress they have suffered under section 13 of the Data Protection Act 1998 in any event?
The first issue
This issue amounts to a common law tort in English law. At para 28 of the judgment of the Court of Appeal Gross LJ said that “this issue is short, straightforward and essentially one of fact.” Gross LJ had “no hesitation in concluding that the Home Office’s publication of the spreadsheet misused TLU’s and TLV’s private and confidential information.” [31] TLT was the lead family claimant and the detailed nature of the information concerning TLT as such meant that TLU and TLV “could readily be identified by third parties” and that they “had a reasonable expectation of privacy and confidentiality in respect of their information in the spreadsheet.” [31]
The second Issue
In terms of section 1 of the Data Protection Act 1998, personal data was defined as meaning “data which relate to a living individual who can be identified (a) from those data, or (b) from those data and other information which is in the possession of, or is likely to come into the possession of, the data controller, and includes any expression of opinion about the individual and any indication of the intentions of the data controller or any other person in respect of the individual.” The Data Protection Act 1998 was the domestic vehicle through which the United Kingdom implemented is obligations under Directive 95/46/EC (which has, of course, now been replaced by the General Data Protection Regulation, but is still relevant for the purpose of this case as that was the law in force at the time). Recital 26 of the Directive noted that the “principles of protection” should take account “of all the means likely reasonably to be used either by the controller or by any other person to identify the” data subject.
In the present case, limb (b) of the definition of personal data was met in relation to TLU and TLV. The Home Office had argued that the information contained in row 1101 of the spreadsheet (which concerned TLT) did not “relate to” TLU and TLV. This was rejected by the court with reference to the statutory language. [39]
The Home Office had also sought to rely on Durant v Financial Services Authority as a means of trying to limit the scope of personal data (and therefore its liability) in this case. However, Gross LJ held that Durant, when properly applied, “powerfully reinforces the case for TLU and TLV” [44] and that Auld LJ was simply stating “a broad, practical working assumption.” [42] There was nothing within Durant that enabled the Court to depart from the conclusions that they must reach in light of the decision by the Court of Appeal in Vidal-Hall v Google and the Supreme Court in Common Services Agency v Scottish Information Commissioner
Third Issue
In the circumstances, this issue did not arise and the court felt it best to leave resolution of it “to a case where a decision is required” on it. [48]
Comment
The appeal was therefore dismissed by Gross LJ on all three issues that were raised and McFarlane LJ and Coulson LJ simply agreed adding no further comments of their own.
This is an interesting, but not unexpected, decision from the Court of Appeal which will be binding on all lower courts in England and Wales and will be persuasive in Scotland. It is difficult to find fault with the approach taken by the Court of Appeal or the judge at first instance; indeed, this is very much the view of the Court of Appeal. It does make it clear though that it will be possible for data subjects not directly referred to within the compromised data arising out of a data breach to sue for damages in certain circumstances. The first instance case had become an important case when such situations arose and now that the Court of Appeal has confirmed the approach adopted by the first instance judge it is likely that we will see more claims of this nature being made.
The circumstances in the present case are fairly clear-cut, but not all situations where liability might arise will be as clear-cut. The GDPR is not going to have any real impact upon this position; the definition of personal data essentially adopts the same two-stage test as was to be found within section 1 of the Data Protection Act 1998. Therefore this pre-GDPR case will continue to be instructive in the post-GDPR world we now inhabit.
If you require further information in relation any data protection or privacy law matter then please do contact Alistair Sloan on 0141 229 0880 or by E-mail. You can also follow our dedicated information law account on twitter for news and updates concerning data protection, privacy and freedom of information.