Former Recruitment Consultant illegally obtained data from job he left

A former Recruitment Consultant has been fined and criminally charged after he illegally obtained data from a job he left.

According to the ICO’s publication report, Daniel Short left a recruitment firm he had been working for, VetPro Recruitment, toward the end of last year and then established his own company named VetSelect.

With his former employee having concerns about the obvious similarities of the companies, and the fact that they hold the data for more than 16,000 vets and nurses for recruitment purposes, they investigated whether Mr Short had taken any data before he left.

When VetPro Recruitment asked Mr Short if he had illegally obtained any data form their database, he reportedly admitted that he’d taken some data for his own record of achievement. This issue was duly reported to the Information Commissioner’s office (ICO) who later determined that Mr Short had illegally obtained the data for some 272 individuals from his former employer’s database.

He pleaded guilty to charges and was fined £355.00 and ordered to pay costs of £700.00, and a victim surcharge of £35.00.

A Criminal Investigations Manager at the ICO said, in response to the successful charges:

“Short thought he could get away with stealing from his old employer to launch his own company. Data Protection laws are there for a reason and the ICO will continue to take action against those who abuse their position.”

No matter how tempting it might be, it’s never OK to illegally take data from one employer to the next; or as seen in this case, from a former employer to be used with a new business setup. This is not the first case of an employer stealing data from ex-employers, and we doubt it will be the last.

People need to be aware that such actions can lead to criminal charges and fines and is a breach of the law.