The Information Commissioner’s Office has issued fines totalling £120,000 to the Leave.EU referendum group and Eldon Insurance – both headed by Aaron Banks, the millionaire businessman who donated £9M to the leave campaign (the biggest political donation in British political history).

The ICO published the following statement:

“The ICO announced an audit and issued a preliminary enforcement notice as well as three notices of intent to fine Leave.EU and Eldon Insurance trading as Go Skippy Insurance, in November 2018 as part of its investigation into data analytics for political purposes.

After considering the companies’ representations, the ICO has issued the fines, confirming a change to one amount, with the other two remaining unchanged. The regulator has also issued two assessment notices to Leave.EU and Eldon Insurance to inform both organisations that they will be audited.

The ICO investigation found that Leave.EU and Eldon Insurance were closely linked. Systems for segregating the personal data of insurance customers’ from that of political subscribers’ were ineffective.

This resulted in Leave.EU using Eldon Insurance customers’ details unlawfully to send almost 300,000 political marketing messages. Leave.EU has been fined £15,000 for this breach.”