[BreachExchange] NSW ambos win $275, 000 class action payout after major data breach

[Destry Winant]

https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/nsw-ambos-win-275-000-class-action-payout-after-major-data-breach-20191210-p53ihu.html

A $275,000 class action payout to NSW Ambulance workers will serve as
a "lesson to all businesses" about private data breaches, their
solicitor says.

In an Australian first, Justice Julie Ward on Monday accepted a
settlement of a class action led by Tracy Evans against the NSW
Ambulance Service over a major data breach.

Justice Ward said Ms Evans would receive three times as much as the
average claimant in the class action, with 108 workers in total
receiving payment.

"I think this is a fantastic result for 108 NSW ambulance workers who
have had their workers' compensation files unlawfully accessed and
extracts of it sold to at least one law firm," solicitor George
Newhouse told reporters outside the Law Courts Building on Monday.

Mr Newhouse, from firm Centennial Lawyers, said the "reasonable"
payout also had broader implications.

"This is the first privacy class action in Australia - it's the first
to go to court and it's the first to settle in this way," he said.

"Employers need to be extremely careful with the data that they
collect on their employees and they need to maintain privacy.

"I think this is a lesson to all businesses and people who collect data."

NSW Ambulance contractor Waqar Malik was convicted of unlawfully
disclosing personal information in 2016 after he sold the worker's
compensation files of 130 former and current employees to personal
injury lawyers.

The files included medical records such as psychiatric assessments and
details of injuries.