Council says sorry for free school meals data breach

The breach, which has affected around 600 Borderers, happened as the council was alerting around 1,300 people who are eligible for the payments.

Three of those emails were sent to multiple individuals, and in those emails all recipient email addresses were visible.

A council spokesperson said: “We would like to apologise unreservedly to all our customers affected by this data breach and for any distress or embarrassment this has caused.

“Those customers who have received an email which includes others’ email addresses are asked to delete it.

"All payments will be made as planned to these individuals.

“Individual email addresses were disclosed, this is personal information.

"The content of the email also outlined that eligibility for the payment was due to the receipt of free school meals, which we absolutely appreciate is a sensitive matter for individuals.

“We are taking the incident very seriously and have discussed it with the Information Commissioner’s Office.

"We are taking steps to put in place a technical solution to minimise the chances of a similar incident occurring again.”

Anyone affected by this data breach with any specific additional concerns should contact the Council’s Data Protection team on [email protected] or call 0300 100 1800.

The spokesperson added: “All those eligible for the payment will be contacted to confirm eligibility before the end of this week.”