Outsourcer Interserve fined £4.4m for failing to stop cyber-attack

Interserve broke data protection law because it failed to put appropriate measures in place to prevent the attack. Photograph: Peter Nicholls/Reuters

Britain’s data watchdog has fined the construction group Interserve £4.4m after a cyber-attack that enabled hackers to steal the personal and financial information of up to 113,000 employees.

The attack occurred when Interserve ran an outsourcing business and was designated a “strategic supplier to the government with clients including the Ministry of Defence”. Bank account details, national insurance numbers, ethnic origin, sexual orientation and religion were among the personal information compromised.