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Cabinet Office fined £500,000 for publishing celebrities’ private addresses

More than 1,000 people – including Elton John and Nadiya Hussain – had home addresses shared by UK government, leading to safety concerns

By Martin Williams
Cabinet Office fined £500,000 for publishing celebrities’ private addresses
‘A sad, sad situation’: Elton John among stars who had their addresses published online | PA Images / Alamy Stock Photo
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The Cabinet Office has been fined £500,000 for publishing the postal addresses of more than 1,000 New Year Honour recipients online.

The accidental disclosure included the private address of Elton John, Tory MP Iain Duncan Smith, and the former director of public prosecutions, Alison Saunders.

The data remained online for two hours and 21 minutes – and was accessed more than 3,800 times.

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Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0