In lieu of a personal apology letter EQC is publicising an open letter which apologises for (another) Government privacy breach. The open letter follows:
An open letter to EQC customers
26 Mar 2013
On behalf of EQC I want to sincerely apologise for the privacy breach that occurred on Friday 22nd March.
The breach was caused when an EQC spreadsheet was sent to the wrong person in error. Embedded in the spreadsheet was information about the 83,000 properties in EQC’s Canterbury Home Repair Programme (CHRP).
There were no names, but the information included claim numbers, street addresses and information about damage and repairs. The information in question related to homes with damage between $15,000 and $100,000 that will be in the Canterbury Home Repair Programme.
So far, EQC has dealt with around 450,000 claims from the Canterbury earthquakes. This breach does not affect EQC customers who have or will be cash settled.
Unfortunately, the breach was caused by human error, and EQC is taking a range of measures to increase the security of customer information.
Again, we apologise sincerely for any distress this has caused any of our customers.
Yours Sincerely,
Ian Simpson,
Chief Executive
The Earthquake Commission (EQC)
