Can My Employer Give Out My Personal Information Without My Consent?

By Stephen Moreau. Last Updated 29th April 2025. In this guide, we will answer the question, ‘Can my employer give out my personal information without my consent?’. UK residents, through various pieces of data protection legislation, have certain rights over the processing of their personal data. We shall examine these rights and explain what laws are in place to protect said data.

As we go, we will explain the data protection laws that are in place, what could happen if these are breached and who could be eligible to make a personal data breach claim for compensation.

To find out if you can make a data breach claim after your employer shared your data without consent, call and speak with an advisor on 020 3870 4868. They can help you get the answers you need. Or you can ask us to call you back using our contact form.

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Can My Employer Give Out My Personal Information Without My Consent?

Any organisation that processes your personal data, including your workplace, must take reasonable steps and measures to protect your personal data. They must also adhere to the rules and regulations found within the Data Protection Act 2018 (DPA) and the UK General Data Protection Regulations (UK GDPR), as together they form data protection laws.

If your workplace were to fail to adhere to data protection laws, this could result in a data breach at work that compromises your personal information. A personal data breach is classified as a security incident that affects personal data’s confidentiality, integrity and availability.

However, you may also be wondering, ‘Can my employer give out my personal information without my consent?’ An organisation must have a lawful basis for processing your personal data. These are:

  1. Consent – you have consented to have your personal data processed.
  2. Contract – the processing is necessary to fulfil a contract.
  3. Legitimate interest – it is necessary for your legitimate interests or the legitimate interests of a third party unless there is a valid reason not to.
  4. Public task – processing is necessary to perform a task in the public interest or for official functions.
  5. Vital interest – processing is necessary to protect a life.
  6. Legal obligation – processing is necessary to comply with the law.

So there may be some instances where your employer does not need your consent to share your personal data, as they have a lawful basis for doing so.

To be able to make a personal data breach compensation claim, you must prove the following:

  1. The breach must have been caused by your workplace’s actions or inactions.
  2. Your personal data must have been involved in the breach.
  3. Due to the personal data breach, you suffered mentally or financially.

To see whether you may have a valid personal data breach claim, you can contact a member of our advisory team.

What Information Could An Employer Give Out?

Personal data is any information that can directly identify someone or indirectly identify them when processed with other information. Examples include:

  • Your name.
  • Your postal address.
  • Your National Insurance number.
  • Your personal email address.

There is also extra protection for certain personal data which is considered sensitive in nature, called special category data. Examples of such data include information on your health, racial origin or ethnicity and sexual orientation.

Some people may ask “Can my employer give out my personal information without my consent?”. Your employer cannot share your personal data without first establishing a lawful basis. Consent is only one of the six lawful bases, so in some cases, your employer may be able to share your personal data without getting your permission.

For more advice on whether you have valid grounds to start a data breach claim against your employer, contact our advisors for free today.

How Can My Employer Breach My Personal Data?

Now we’ve explored the answer to the question “Can my employer give out my personal information without my consent?”, we will discuss how exactly an employer could potentially breach your personal data and disobey data protection legislation.

Your employer has a responsibility to ensure that anyone who has access to employee data is provided with up-to-date data protection training. This is to prevent a human error data breach. 

Examples of how a human error data breach could happen include:

  • Verbal disclosures of personal data.
  • Losing electronic equipment or paperwork with employee records on them. For example, leaving a laptop that contains employee personal data on a train. 
  • Errors when sending emails, such as using the blind carbon copy (BCC) incorrectly. 
  • Posting a letter containing personal data to the wrong address.

Additionally, your employer has a responsibility to ensure that any employee personal data that is electronically stored is secure from cyberattacks. They can ensure this by giving employees cybersecurity training and ensuring that cybersecurity systems are up-to-date.

Please contact us today if your employer was negligent and breached your personal data at work. We want to help you claim compensation for your suffering.

How Much Can I Claim If My Employer Breached My Personal Data?

How much data breach compensation could be awarded in a successful employer data breach claim? As we have discussed in the previous section, if your case is a success, you can claim for the material and non-material damage you have suffered.

In order to have a valid data breach claim, the onus will be on you to prove how the organisation responsible for keeping your data secure failed to do this in accordance with data protection law. This will need to have led to your personal data being breached and you subsequently suffering with material or non-material damage.

However, to give you an idea of the amounts that could be awarded for non-material damage, we have looked to the Judicial College Guidelines JCG which is often used by the legal system to value injuries.

The table below contains figures from the JCG (except for the top row), but should be referred to for guidance only.

Health ProblemSeverityPotential Compensation
Very serious psychiatric harm plus material lossVery SeriousUp to £250,000+
Psychiatric damage generallySevere (a)£66,920 to £141,240
Moderately Severe (b)£23,270 to £66,920
Moderate (c)£7,150 to £23,270
Less Severe (d)£1,880 to £7,150
PTSDSevere (a)£73,050 to £122,850
Moderately Severe (b)£28,250 to £73,050
Moderate (c)£9,980 to £28,250
Less Severe (d)£4,820 to £9,980

Make A No Win No Fee Data Breach Claim

If your personal data has been compromised in a data breach at work, and you meet the eligibility criteria to make a personal data breach compensation claim, one of the solicitors on our panel may be able to help you.

As well as having years of experience handling data breach claims, they may offer to represent you under the terms of a Conditional Fee Agreement. With this No Win No Fee contract in place, you will not be expected to pay them for their services in the following instances:

  • Upfront.
  • During the claims process.
  • If the claim fails.

Should your claim be successful, your solicitor will be due a success fee. This fee will be taken directly from your compensation as a legally limited percentage.

To see if you can make a claim with one of the solicitors on our panel, you can contact our advisors. They can also help answer your questions, such as, ‘Can my employer give out my personal information without my consent?’. To get in touch with them today, you can:

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