Kentish Express Ashford & District
Mum’s shock at nursery’s ‘disgusting’ data breach
Confidential information about children found in daughter’s bag Exclusive
An Ashford mother said she was horrified to find streams of personal information about her daughter’s classmates in her nursery folder.
Michelle Carter- Howard believes the private details of more than 50 youngsters at Jelly Beans Day Nursery – including telephone numbers and addresses – had accidently fallen into her three-year-old’s bag.
The Kingsnorth mum said she felt “sick to her stomach” when she discovered the details, and said she was “gobsmacked” that the nursery had made such a huge error.
She said: “I thought I would have a look through my daughter’s folder to see what she has been doing and I spotted this bit of paper.
“As I looked down I saw names, address, allergies, contact numbers, second contact numbers of all the children at the nursery.
“I just couldn’t believe it. How can those details get out so easily? What if these are details of looked-after children?
“What if they had fallen into the hands of a father who wasn’t allowed contact with their child? “It could have been anything. “I felt sick to the pit of my stomach. It’s disgusting.
“People should be more guarded and more careful of what they are doing.
“I find it really upsetting and careless that something like this could happen.”
The Field View nursery, which is owned and run by Ranc Care, received a good Ofsted report after its last inspection in 2013.
Mike Higginson, a spokesman for Ranc Care, said: “We are in contact with the Child Support Agency, Ofsted and police, and we have got vulnerable people in our care.
“We have contacted the police and we are greatly concerned that such information has fallen into incorrect hands, but we are confident that our processes have been robust here and we do not understand how this happened so we’re going to let the police investigate that.”
A police spokesman confirmed officers were contacted by the nursery last week but they were not investigating any criminal offences.
‘I felt sick to the pit of my stomach’