Court of Appeal lowers threshold for data protection compensation
02/09/2025 | 11KBW Panopticon Blog
In a significant judgment, the Court of Appeal for England and Wales has lowered the threshold for data protection breaches and claims compensation. In Farley v Paymaster 1836 Ltd (trading as Equiniti), the Court ruled that there is no "threshold of seriousness" that claimants must meet to be entitled to compensation for "non-material damage," aligning the UK's position with European Union case law. This overturns a previous UK Supreme Court ruling that had blocked low-value claims.
The ruling stems from a case in which the defendant, Equiniti, mistakenly sent the pension statements of 750 police officers to former addresses. A High Court judge had initially dismissed most claims, arguing that without proof the envelopes had been opened, there was no actionable processing of personal data. The Court of Appeal disagreed, clarifying that the misaddressing itself constituted a breach. The case has now been sent back to the High Court to determine if data protection breaches occurred and what compensation should be awarded.
Additional legal analysis by Bird & Bird.
Training Announcement: Freevacy offers a range of independent data protection qualifications from IAPP and BCS. Our certified courses are available at foundation and practitioner levels and cover multiple legal jurisdictions, data protection operations management, and the implementation of complex privacy solutions in technical environments. Find out more.
What is this page?
You are reading a summary article on the Privacy Newsfeed, a free resource for DPOs and other professionals with privacy or data protection responsibilities helping them stay informed of industry news all in one place. The information here is a brief snippet relating to a single piece of original content or several articles about a common topic or thread. The main contributor is listed in the top left-hand corner, just beneath the article title.
The Privacy Newsfeed monitors over 300 global publications, of which more than 6,250 summary articles have been posted to the online archive dating back to the beginning of 2020. A weekly roundup is available by email every Friday.