This guide explains when and how you can claim for a magistrates’ court data breach. Firstly, we cover the data protection legislation that sets out the court’s legal responsibility to keep your personal data safe. Additionally, we explain the eligibility requirements for starting a compensation claim.
Continuing through the guide, you can get an idea of the personal data a magistrates’ court may be responsible for processing. We also look at how to prove that a court was responsible for a breach that caused you financial damage, emotional harm, or both.
Furthermore, we use guideline figures to give an illustration of what a data protection claim payout could look like. Read to the end of the guide to learn how our expert solicitors help clients seek compensation on a No Win No Fee basis.
If you’d like to know more about claiming compensation, or whether you have the right to start a data breach claim, contact us now for free and helpful guidance. Our 24/7 service is available when you either:
- Phone our free helpline on 0800 073 8804.
- Ask about making a claim online and leaving us some contact details.
- Open the live support tab at the bottom of the page.
Select A Section
- How To Claim For A Magistrates’ Court Data Breach
- Types Of Personal Data Handled By Courts
- How To Prove A Magistrates’ Court Breached Your Data
- What Could You Claim For A Court Data Breach?
- Can A No Win No Fee Solicitor Help With Magistrates’ Court Data Breach Claims?
- Learn More About Data Breach Claims
How To Claim For A Magistrates’ Court Data Breach
The term ‘personal data’ refers to information that can be used to identify a person, either by itself or alongside another piece of information. Up to three parties can be involved when data is processed:
- Data subjects, who the data relates to or can be used to identify.
- Data controllers, who decide how and when data is processed. In the context of a magistrates’ court data breach claim, the court is the data controller.
- Data processors. A data controller can process the data itself, but it might instruct a third-party data processor to do it for them.
A data controller or processor must uphold two major pieces of data protection law: the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) and the Data Protection Act 2018 (DPA).
Regardless of the capacity in which you appear in a magistrates’ court, the court has a legal obligation to safeguard against personal data breaches that could affect you.
According to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), a personal data breach is a security incident affecting the confidentiality, integrity or availability of a person’s personal data.
As an affected data subject, you could make a data breach compensation claim if you can show that:
- A data controller or processor’s failure to adhere to the law led to a data breach or allowed a breach to occur.
- Your personal data was affected by the breach.
- You suffered psychologically, financially or both as a direct result.
You can learn more about starting legal action, including the time limit for submitting data breach cases, by calling our free helpline today.
Types Of Personal Data Handled By Courts
The magistrates’ court is the starting point for criminal cases. The court will refer the more serious cases to the Crown Court and handle minor or ‘either way’ offences, ranging from minor criminal damage to burglary. As a result, the court could process personal data related to defendants, lawyers, witnesses or others involved in a case, such as a jury panel.
Personal data that a magistrates’ court might hold includes your:
- Name.
- Date of birth.
- Phone number.
- Home address.
- Email address.
- Bank account information.
They may also have access to special category data, which is especially sensitive and requires extra protection. This can include data revealing or concerning your:
- Racial or ethnic background.
- Religious or philosophical beliefs.
- Biometric data, where used for identification purposes.
- Health.
- Sexual orientation.
Criminal offence data should also be afforded extra protection. This is the personal data of offenders or suspected offenders in relation to criminal activity, allegations, investigations, and proceedings.
Numerous people within the court may have access to this information as part of the legal process. If data protection laws aren’t adhered, a data protection breach could occur. However, to claim for a magistrates’ court breach, you need to prove wrongful conduct resulted in a breach of your personal data and caused you to suffer emotional harm and/or financial damage.
For example, if the court got your address wrong and sent a summons to the wrong postage address, your private information would be available to an unauthorised person, which could lead to significant distress.
Alternatively, leaving documents unattended during a court case and allowing someone to steal sensitive data could come at a serious cost to your mental health and finances.
Call our free helpline for further information on data breach claims and whether you have the right to claim for a magistrates’ court data breach.
How To Prove A Magistrates’ Court Breached Your Data
All breach of data protection claims rely on relevant evidence. Such claims must show clearly that the data controller or processor acted wrongfully, and that there is a direct path linking a data breach to the claimant’s suffering.
The court may provide evidence by sending a letter of notification. Data controllers are obliged to tell affected data subjects if a data breach incident occurred that puts their rights and freedoms at risk.
This should happen without undue delay, but you can contact the court directly if you believe a data breach has occurred and you haven’t been notified. Keep a record of all contact as supporting evidence for your claim.
In qualifying cases, the organisation responsible for processing data also has to notify the ICO. Again, you could proactively inform the ICO if they are not already aware, and their findings could add to your evidence.
Furthermore, you should collect any documents that highlight how the data breach affected you. A psychiatrist’s report can outline any psychological injury suffered, while bank or credit card statements are examples of proof of financial loss. This may influence how the value of your data breach claim is calculated, as we cover in the next section.
You can get further relevant information about data breach claim evidence, plus how an experienced data breach solicitor could help you gather proof to aid your case, by calling us today.
What Could You Claim For A Court Data Breach?
A data breach can have a significant impact, in multiple ways. Therefore, it is possible for a claim payout to include compensation for two different forms of damage. You can seek compensation for both, or just one. They are non-material and material damage, both of which we explain below.
The term ‘non-material damage’ refers to psychological damage caused or made worse by a data breach. For example, someone’s personal data being lost could lead to the likes of:
- Anxiety.
- Stress.
- Depression.
- Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
A number of factors determine how much compensation you would receive in a successful claim for a magistrates’ court data breach, including the extent of the mental injury and how much it affects your life.
We have used the Judicial College Guidelines (JCG) to make the table you can see below. The JCG is a document made up of guideline compensation brackets sometimes used as guidance for non-material damage calculations.
Compensation Table
The top line of this table is not from the JCG. Also, please remember that the table is only a guide.
| MENTAL INJURY | SEVERITY | COMPENSATION GUIDELINES | NOTES |
|---|---|---|---|
| Severe Psychiatric Harm Plus Substantial Financial Damage | Severe | Up to £500,000+ | A payout addressing non-material and material damage. Compensation accounts for severe psychological injuries and substantial financial losses such as relocation costs and counselling fees. |
| General Psychological Injury | Severe | £66,920 to £141,240 | Factors contributing to the payout include how the affected person handles life, education, work and relationships. In severe cases, there are marked problems and the prognosis is very poor. |
| Moderately Severe | £23,270 to £66,920 | While there are issues with the factors noted in severe cases, the overall prognosis is much more optimistic. | |
| Moderate | £7,150 to £23,270 | There is a good prognosis and improvement made by the affected person. | |
| Less Severe | £1,880 to £7,150 | The award given will depend on how long the person was affected and to what extent. | |
| Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder | Severe | £73,050 to £122,850 | Effects are permanent and restrict the injured person from working at all, or at least to pre-trauma levels. It affects all aspects of life. |
| Moderately Severe | £28,250 to £73,050 | Professional help allows for some recovery and better prognosis than those severely affected. However, significant disability is still likely. | |
| Moderate | £9,980 to £28,250 | The affected person largely recovers and does not experience grossly disabling ongoing effects. | |
| Less Severe | £4,820 to £9,980 | A mostly full recovery is made within a couple of years and only minor issues persist for longer. |
What Is Material Damage?
When a claimant’s data is compromised, they may end up facing unavoidable and likely irrecoverable costs as a result. With that in mind, it is possible to seek compensation for material damage, meaning the financial harm inflicted after a personal data breach. You could seek material damage compensation if you lost money due to, for example:
- Being unable to work because of the effects of a breach.
- Having to move home or job.
- Paying for costs associated with mental health treatment.
As well as the bank or credit card statements we discussed earlier, other forms of relevant evidence could include rent statements, payslips or invoices. Keep hold of any documents that could help prove the extent of material damage.
Can A No Win No Fee Solicitor Help With Magistrates’ Court Data Breach Claims?
You could benefit from the expert services of one of our data breach solicitors if you have a valid claim and want support throughout the claims process.
Having a specialist solicitor represent you can make all the difference to a claim and ensures that every important step of the process is handled with professional care.
Our solicitors offer a Conditional Fee Agreement (CFA), which is a type of No Win No Fee deal. This means that you do not have to pay for their work if the case loses. Another benefit of a CFA is that there are no upfront or running solicitor fees.
If your claim for a magistrates’ court data breach is successful, you would receive compensation. A small percentage of the payout would go to the solicitor as their success fee. However, a legal cap set out by The Conditional Fee Agreements Order 2013 ensures the percentage set aside for the solicitor is minor.
Contact Us
Our advisors are available all day, every day. They can not only answer your questions as part of a free consultation, but also evaluate whether you have reasonable grounds to seek compensation.
Although there is no obligation to claim even if you have a case, an advisor can easily connect you to a trained data breach solicitor if you want to explore your options.
Whether you want advice after your data was breached, or you’re seeking guidance on getting a claim started, we can help.
It’s easy to reach us and our advisors are ready to help you, so either:
- Call 0800 073 8804.
- Write to us about your potential claim online so we can get back to you.
- Send us a message using the live chat feature below.
Learn More About Data Breach Claims
We hope our guide has helped you. For even more data breach guidance, check out the below articles:
- Our lawyer data breach guide explains when and how you can claim compensation.
- Our UK GDPR claim compensation calculator provides more information about how you could be compensated.
- We take a look at probation officer data breach compensation claims.
These resources could also prove helpful:
- Information on data protection and the DPA from the Crown Prosecution Service.
- A data protection privacy notice shared on Judiciary.UK that explains how the judiciary of England and Wales process your data in certain capacities.
- Guidance on dealing with data breaches from the National Cyber Security Centre.
Call our free helpline today for further support or to ask whether you can start your claim for a magistrates’ court data breach.
