Accountants' personal details 'published online'

News Article - 20 August 2008
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Personal details of more than 17,000 members of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in Ireland have been mistakenly posted online during a redesign of the organisation's website, Accountancy Magazine reports.

Contact information including home addresses, email addresses, phone numbers and dates of birth were made available to view when the institute's membership database was put on the site in error last month.

The website was launched on July 10th and the mistake was not picked up until August 5th.

A representative from the institute said the incident was the result of human error, but he said there had not been a breach of the group's internal hardware or software system.

Pat Costello, the institute's chief executive, wrote to the members explaining what had occurred.

He wrote there is no indication "there has been any unlawful use of the data".

Earlier this month, the Independent in Ireland reported a number of judgements in favour of the taxman had pulled in almost €320,000 (£250,000) for the Irish tax authorities.

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