A law firm has filed class action proceedings against icare over a data breach affecting about 192,000 people.

Piper Alderman says the group lawsuit is on behalf of workers who “had their sensitive health and personal information” disclosed in May 2022.

“The proceeding arises from the unauthorised disclosure by icare … The breach was the result of an administrative error, which led to 1450 insurance reports being distributed by email to unintended recipients.

“These reports contained highly sensitive information, including workers’ personal and health details.”

Piper Alderman says the action alleges NSW state insurer icare “owed the plaintiff and the class members an equitable obligation of confidence, which it breached when it disseminated the insurance reports to entities that were not the intended recipients.

“The information disclosed included details such as workers’ full names, dates of birth, description of occupation, claim history, injury categories (psychological or physical), policy numbers, information on whether liability was accepted or declined, breakdowns of weekly payments, claim costs and gross amounts paid.”

A spokesperson for icare said today it would be inappropriate to comment because the matter is before the NSW Supreme Court.

icare says it took immediate action after it was made aware of the breach. It says human error related to manual processing led to the 1450 cost of claims reports being emailed to about 570 incorrect recipients.