British Telecom faces legal issues after failing to leverage email compliance

Contributed by Roumiana Deltcheva (Thursday, September 30, 2010) | Category : Email security

A recent data loss incident may put British Telecom in the middle of an ongoing legal case in the UK involving a prior issue involving legal firm ACS:Law.

Authorities in the country are debating whether British Telecom violated the Data Protection Act when it recently leaked personal information of more than 500 customers as a result of an email mishap. An official with British Telecom has since confirmed that one of its attorneys sent a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet containing customers' personal information in an unsecured email.

British Telecom has fallen into an ACS:Law legal case, as the law firm had been involved in a separate email security controversy in which a court order mandated internet service providers to deliver data to ACS:Law via "electronic text format by way of Microsoft Excel file saved in an encrypted form to a compact disk, or any other digital media," according to the BBS.

British Telecom may now face legal ramifications after failing to comply with Data Protection Act rulings that had prohibited the use of email for sensitive customer information.

In fact, businesses that operate in the UK could benefit from email compliance solutions, as even Google and Facebook have violated the country's Data Protection Act.