Former GP surgery secretary fined for unlawfully reading patient medical records

A former trainee secretary at a GP surgery has been ordered to pay nearly £1,000 in fines and costs after she admitted unlawfully reading the records of 231 patients in two years.

Hannah Pepper was employed at the Fakenham Medical Practice in Norfolk in August 2015 and her duties included lawfully accessing medical records to assist doctors, solicitors and insurance companies.

The surgery discovered in October 2017 that Pepper had, despite being trained in the legal and ethical requirements for patient confidentiality, been reading a work colleague’s patient file without consent.

A subsequent investigation by the surgery found that the defendant had illegally accessed 231 patient records with no valid reason. These included colleagues and their families, her own relatives, friends and acquaintances and also members of the public.

In a subsequent interview with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) she accepted she had no justifiable reason for accessing the records and suggested that at times she struggled with the monotony of some of her tasks.

Pepper, aged 23, of Ashside, Syderstone, Norfolk, admitted four charges of unlawfully accessing personal data in breach of s55 of the Data Protection Act 1998 when she appeared at Kings Lynn Magistrates’ Court.

She was fined £350 and was also ordered to pay costs of £643.75 and a victim surcharge of £35.

Mike Shaw, the ICO’s Criminal Investigation Group Manager, said: “People whose job allows them access to confidential and often sensitive information have been placed in a position of trust, and with that trust comes added responsibility.

“Data protection law exists for a reason and curiosity or boredom is no excuse for failing to respect people’s legal right to privacy. Just because you can do something, that doesn’t mean you should.”