Pro-brexit campaign facing data misuse fines

LONDON: Companies linked to a leading pro-brexit donor are being fined a total of £135,000 ($176,000) for data protection breaches during Britain’s 2016 referendum, officials said on Tuesday.

The Leave.eu campaign, bankrolled by businessman Arron Banks, used the personal data of customers of an insurance company owned by the businessman to send them political marketing material unlawfully.

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) regulator said it had issued a notice of intent to fine Leave. EU and Eldon Insurance, trading as Goskippy, £60,000 each for “serious breaches” of electronic marketing law.

“More than one million e-mails were sent to Leave.eu subscribers over two separate periods which also included marketing for Goskippy services, without their consent,” in a breach of regulations, the ICO said.

The ICO also intends to fine Leave. EU a further £15,000 for a “separate, serious breach” after almost 300,000 e-mails were sent to Eldon Insurance customers containing a Leave.eu newsletter.

It said it was also investigating allegations that Eldon shared customer data obtained for insurance purposes with Leave.eu. Banks played down the announcement.

“The ICO find no evidence of a grand data conspiracy and find we may have accidentally sent a newsletter to customers,” he said on Twitter.

Vote Leave was the official probrexit campaign in Britain’s 2016 referendum on its European Union membership, in which 52 per cent backed quitting the bloc.

Leave.eu was the biggest unofficial campaign.