Stratford District Council makes shock announcement that residents’ email addresses have been leaked in data breach

The district council says it is extremely concerned about a data breach that has exposed residents’ email addresses.

Stratford District Council said it became aware of a data breach on Monday (20th November).

A spokesperson said: “Initial investigations suggests that the data breach is restricted to a database of email addresses which had been supplied to the council by residents; the district council does not believe at this stage that any further personal data is affected.”

The council has referred the breach immediately to the Information Commissioner’s Office, and involved Warwickshire Police.

“It is believed that this data breach is an isolated incident and does not reflect a general failure of internal controls,” continued the spokesperson.

“The district council has instigated a full internal investigation to determine exactly what has happened and to identify the scope of the data breach.

David Buckland, Chief Executive of Stratford on Avon District Council said: “The privacy and security of personal information is paramount, and we are extremely concerned that such a data breach has occurred.

“We take these matters very seriously and immediately commissioned an internal investigation to understand how this happened. We sincerely apologise to those who may have been affected by this data breach on behalf of the Council.

“We have self-reported this as a data breach to the Information Commissioner's Office and will cooperate fully with them and or any other agency as maybe required.”

The council declined to answer any further questions from the Herald, and responded: “So as not to interfere with the ongoing investigations, the District Council will not be making any further comment at this time.”

See tomorrow’s Stratford Herald.