Documents detailing sensitive information regarding allegations of child neglect were left besides an office printer.
Plymouth City Council 
has been fined £60,000 ($96,133/€74,268) by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) for a severe breach of the Data Protection Act after it was discovered that a council employee printed and left documents featuring sensitive information pertaining to allegations of child neglect, reports ITPro.
A council worker collected three pages of sensitive information next to a printer containing information regarding two adults and four children. These pages were subsequently sent to the wrong person by a social worker.
Stephen Eckersley, Head of Enforcement, ICO, commented: “It would be too easy to consider this a simple human error. The reality is that this incident happened because not enough care was being taken within the organisation when handling vulnerable people’s sensitive information.”
A spokesperson for Plymouth City Council commented: “In line with guidance, the incident was reported to the Information Commissioner’s Office. The three pages were quickly recovered and destroyed, both clients were spoken with about the incident and our sincerest apologies were offered.
“Practical steps to prevent a similar situation happening again were taken including secure pin printing so that reports are only printed when staff activate the printer with their code, which reduces the risk of papers being mixed up.”