Scam emails from data breaches: compensation advice

Those who receive scam emails from data breaches could be eligible to claim compensation on a No Win, No Fee basis now, as the GDPR can entitle people to be able to claim.

Your Lawyers – The Data Leak Lawyers – is a leading firm of privacy compensation experts, representing thousands of people and having launched over 50 group and multi-party cases. With our history and experience dating back to much longer than many other firms out there when it comes to this niche area of law, we have already recovered over £1m in damages for mostly individual data clients.

Want to know if we can help you with a data breach legal case? No problem – just contact the team here now for free, no-obligation advice!

Scam emails from data breaches

Scam emails from data breaches are a real threat and a real worry. They can arise in many ways, with examples including:

• Contact lists being exposed, allowing criminals to set up fake email accounts to target people with scams as they try to pass themselves off as the breached organisation.
• Genuine email accounts for an organisation being hacked and compromised, allowing scammers to send emails from the real accounts.
• Wider information breaches could allow scammers to not only obtain contact lists, but also key information they can use to dupe their victims. For example, if a company complaints register is hacked, scammers could contact the victims pretending to be contacting them specifically about their legitimate complaint. This could increase the chances of a victim falling for the scam.

These are just three quick examples, but the major takeaway here is that it is possible for people to be targeted by scam communications as a result of a data breach. It does happen, and one of the most infamous examples was where victims of the TalkTalk hack from 2015 had been contacted by scammers who had legitimate account details that are suspected to have been obtained via the breach. They could use this to pass themselves off as TalkTalk, and some got away with stealing a lot of money.

Claiming compensation for a data breach

Those who are in receipt of scam emails from data breaches could be entitled to claim compensation on a No Win, No Fee basis with us.

If we can prove that there is a direct link between the happening of the emails with a data breach, this is where you could be eligible to claim. The examples above are instances where you could be owed thousands of pounds in data breach compensation if private information about you has been misused and/or exposed.

You can speak to the team here now for free, no-obligation advice about your rights to make a data breach compensation case.

A recent example: Whitby High School

There are many instances of scam emails from data breaches, and we can look at one recent potential example that was reported in the Liverpool Echo in the last few weeks.

According to the media reports, dozens of parents and guardians have been in receipt of scam emails where recipients are being told to click links. Emails appear as though they are from the school itself but are understood to be fake sender addresses, and the school has confirmed that it is looking into the matter in respect of whether these emails arise due to a breach. The school in question is reported to be the The Whitby High School of Ellesmere Port.

Reports from people in receipt of the scam emails suggest that there have been references to previous conversations, so this factor – and the fact that specific parents and guardians are receiving them – could suggest that scammers have gained knowledge from a breach. If it transpires that the scam emails have arisen from some form of leak or exposure of private information, there could be legal cases to answer.

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