Church of England 'profoundly concerned' after Kennedys email blunder

Kennedys has apologised after mistakenly exposing the email addresses of almost 200 people involved in the Church of England’s abuse redress scheme.

The error happened on Tuesday evening when a message was sent to 194 individuals and law firms who had registered to receive scheme updates. Due to “human error”, the firm said, all recipients could see each other’s email addresses. No further personal information was disclosed, and attempts to recall the message were only partly successful, it confirmed.

Kennedys has been working with the Church since March 2024 as the independent administrator of the scheme - which supports victims and survivors of Church-related abuse.

It has contacted everyone affected and reported the breach to SRA. The firm has also launched a full internal investigation into how the error occurred.

What they said

In a statement, the firm said: "Kennedys is deeply sorry for the hurt and concern caused to everyone affected by this significant error and accepts full responsibility.

"We understand the significant impact this will have on those affected for which we apologise unreservedly.

"We remain committed to supporting victims and survivors of Church of England-related abuse to secure the financial redress, therapeutic, spiritual and emotional support, acknowledgement of wrongdoing on the part of the Church, apology and other forms of bespoke redress under this scheme."

The Church of England commented: "We recognise the distress this has caused, particularly for survivors who trusted the scheme to handle their information with care and confidentiality.

"While the Church of England is not the data controller for the Redress Scheme and does not hold or manage the data in question, we are nonetheless profoundly concerned. We are in discussions with Kennedys to understand how this breach occurred and to ensure robust steps are taken to prevent anything similar from happening again."