Personal injury firms have been warned by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) that they could face fines if they are found out to have obtained work through nuisance calls and spam texts.
The warning comes off the back of a report which showed that a record number of complaints had been received in relation to accident claims in the last three months of 2013.
It is thought that many firms maybe unaware that they are in breach of the Data Protection Act when acting on leads, generated by the unlawful methods, which is why the ICO have released the warning.
Talking on behalf of the ICO, Enforcement Group Manager, Andy Curry, said: “The message is quite clear to law firms – do your due diligence and check the provenance of the data to make sure it was obtained lawfully.
“We are looking to push our guidance to the legal sector and the same rules apply to law firms as to anyone else.”
The legal industry is heavily regulated against such practices taking place and is only supposed to carry out electronic marketing if the people they are contacting have given their permission to be.
Such methods have long since been frowned upon by the personal injury sector, with both MASS and APIL campaigning to bring cold calling and spam texts to an end.
Image source(s)
1. Youtube; https://www.youtube.com/user/icocomms