Vicarious liability also known as imputed liability is a situation in the legal system where an individual who did not directly commit or cause damage or harm bears the consequences as long as the individual has a specific superior legal relationship to the perpetrator of the action. This paper describes the case of the Morrisons employees’ data leak as an example of vicarious liability .
The case of Morrisons’ employees’ personal details leak reveals the use of vicarious liability in the court so as to make sure that large companies answer for their employee's actions in accordance to the principle of social justice. According to the case, a file with 99, 998 Morrisons’ employees’ details found its way to the internet. The details were posted on a file-sharing website and then links to the site posted somewhere else in the web including newspapers by Andrew Skelton; a former senior auditor at the Morrisons Bradford headquarters. His actions were motivated by a grudge over an incidence that he was accused of dealing “legal highs” at work. Among the details contained in the file were the salary, account numbers to various banks, bank sort codes, national insurance numbers, phone numbers, date of birth, gender, addresses, and names. He sentenced to eight years in jail in 2015.
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The action raised various questions including whether the employer is answerable, directly or vicariously, for the actions of the rogue subordinate of disclosing confidential information of fellow employees on the internet. Additionally, the question as to whether under the Data Protection Act (DPA) of 1998 the employer is liable for an act of misuse of private information or breach of confidence. Though the Court established that the Morrisons were not guilty of breaking any data protection principles and the Data Protection Act doesn’t impose principal accountability to them, it held that the Morrisons were vicariously liable in the account of all the criminal actions undertaken by their employees.
Reference
Morrisons liable for staff data leak. (2018). Retrieved from https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-42193502
