Data for sale online – claim compensation

Date of sale online is a modern problem that can affect millions of people worldwide. If your personal information has been exposed as a result of a data breach, you could be entitled to claim compensation.

For eligible clients, we are happy to be able to offer No Win, No Fee legal representation. As long as we consider that you have a good enough chance of being able to secure compensation, we may be able to represent you this way.

Data breaches leading to data for sale online

A data breach can result in criminals putting up data for sale online. Exposed information can end up on the dark web where it could then be traded, often for digital currency, for criminals to then misuse it.

In many cases, the actual hackers who expose information are not the ones who go on to try to commit theft and fraud. It is often the case that it is the criminals that information is sold to who will then try to misuse it in this way. It is thought that there may be billions of pieces of data for sale online which have been placed on marketplaces on the dark web over many years. Sometimes, it can take years between a data breach happening and the actual information ending up online.

Data breaches are a leading cause of information ending up in the hands of criminals. The difficulty is that, once information has been exposed, it is usually the case that it is very difficult to undo the loss of control that has been caused.

Claiming compensation

If you discover that data for sale online involves information about you, you could be eligible to claim compensation if the exposure stems from a privacy breach. You will normally pursue the organisation who the information was stolen from on the basis of negligence in failing to protect your personal data. You will not normally try to pursue criminals, as it is generally a fruitless exercise trying to take criminals to court, particularly as their identities are often unknown.

The GDPR means that all data controllers have important duties and responsibilities to protect the information in their charge. This includes deploying adequate cybersecurity measures to prevent hackers from gaining access to servers and systems. If a successful cyberattack has resulted in the exposure of personal information, the question we will ask is what more could – and should – have been done to have prevented the information being exposed. If the answer is that more should have been done, it may be that the organisation is liable to compensate you.

You may then be entitled to claim compensation for any distress that has been caused by the loss of control of your personal information. Even if you have not suffered any losses or expenses from fraud or theft, you can still claim for the distress element alone. It can be incredibly worrying to know that our personal information is in the hands of criminals who could then try to exploit it and target us with fraud. This distress can be significant enough to warrant a claim for privacy breach compensation.

Of course, if you have incurred any losses or expenses from fraud or theft that is directly linked to a data breach event, you could be entitled to pursue compensation for this.

No Win, No Fee legal representation

For eligible clients, we are able to offer No Win, No Fee legal representation for people to pursue claims for distress caused by the loss of control of information from privacy breaches. We are happy to work this way as we are true believers in access to justice, and we will carefully risk assess your claim to ensure that we consider there are reasonable prospects of being able to succeed with it.

Our team is happy to provide free, no-obligation legal advice – please complete the contact form below and speak to us at a time that is convenient for you.