Nearly half a million Lloyds customers hit by data breach after IT glitch

Lloyds Banking Group has paid out compensation after nearly half a million people were impacted by an IT glitch exposing the personal data of customers earlier this month.

The company said up to 447,936 Lloyds, Halifax and Bank of Scotland customers saw other people’s transactions or had their data shared with others due to IT issues on March 12.

Jasjyot Singh, consumer relations boss at Lloyds, apologised for the incident on behalf of the bank in a letter disclosing the scope of the issue to Parliament’s Treasury Select Committee.

The banking firm confirmed 114,182 people clicked on other people’s transactions when they became visible.

It added they therefore may have been shown more detailed information such as account details, national insurance numbers and payment references.

The bank has so far paid out £139,000 in compensation to 3,625 customers for distress and inconvenience linked to the incident.

It said no customers have so far been identified as suffering financial losses as a result.

The letter highlighted the personal data of individuals who were not Lloyds group customers had also been visible.

Lloyds said the incident was caused by a “software defect” from an overnight IT update.

Chair of the Treasury Committee, Dame Meg Hillier, said: “Modern banking methods mean we can now perform a variety of tasks on our phones in a matter of seconds, and almost anywhere.

“What this incident brings into focus is the fact that there is a trade-off.

“By moving more interactions with our bank online, we place our faith in technology which can suffer unpredictable errors.”

A Lloyds spokesman said: “On March 12, some customers using our app may have briefly seen transactions that were not their own following an IT change.

“The issue was quickly identified and resolved, and we’ve contacted customers whose transactions may have been visible for that short time.”