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Afghan data breach superinjunction an “extraordinary affront to open justice”, Society warns

Posted on: July 15, 2025 by admin

The government’s decision to use an unprecedented superinjunction banning the media from reporting that a catastrophic data breach by the Ministry of Defence (MOD) had led to the setting up of a secret migration scheme bringing thousands of Afghans to Britain at a cost of billions of pounds, is an “extraordinary affront to open justice” and erodes public trust in democratic accountability, the Director of the Society of Editors has warned. 

The Society’s comments came after the superinjunction was today lifted allowing reporting of the fact that a military data breach in 2022 had exposed the names of 33,000 Afghans who had applied for sanctuary in the UK in a scheme for those who had worked with British forces to flee the Taliban. As a result of the data breach, which the previous government became aware of in 2023, it set up a secret relocation scheme which, so far, has seen 18,500 Afghans whose data was lost, flown to Britain amid fears for their safety. 

The superinjunction, first obtained by the MOD in September 2023, was only initially expected to be in place for a few weeks while the government identified and helped those most at risk, however it remained in place, despite repeated challenges for transparency by the media, for more than 600 days.

Dawn Alford, Executive Director of the Society of Editors said: “The government’s use of an unprecedented superinjunction to ban media reporting around a catastrophic military data breach and secret relocation scheme to bring thousands of Afghans to Britain is an extraordinary affront to open justice and erodes public trust in democratic accountability.

“It is absurd that, in 2025, journalists should face the threat of jail in Britain for holding government to account and facilitating proper public scrutiny on a matter of such serious moral and economic concern.

“For nearly two years, government ministers have been able to make decisions about the safety and resettlement of thousands of people at an enormous cost to British taxpayers without any transparency or public scrutiny around decisions made.

“Open justice is a fundamental principle at the very heart of our democratic system and the government’s decision to silence media reporting on such a matter of profound public interest, for nearly two years, beggars belief.”

Read the oral statement from Defence Secretary John Healey (pictured) on the data breach here