On Monday 9 October the Future of Church Safeguarding Programme became aware that a document containing information relating to its upcoming visit to the diocese of Coventry had been sent in error to one of the people scheduled to participate in this visit. 

This document contained the names of 11 people the Programme was scheduled to meet during the visit and a short summary of their interest in the work of the Programme. The document did not contain any other personal data, for example any contact details.

The individual who received the document in error was one of the 11 people scheduled to meet the Programme. They were neither a Church employee nor a Church volunteer. After the Programme contacted this individual, they provided assurances that they had deleted the document and would not share the information onwards.

The Programme, which is staffed by Crest Advisory, informed all those people affected by this breach and apologised to them for its error and for any anxiety it caused.

The Programme put in place an offer of support to those affected and reported the incident to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). The ICO has since determined that it does not need to take any further action in relation to this incident.

The Programme takes its responsibility to keep information safe extremely seriously and has reviewed its procedures to ensure this cannot happen again.