Japan Fair Trade Commission: a survey summary was emailed to two organizations and one business with the source spreadsheet still embedded in its charts, exposing data on 1,381 people

1. 2020-08-14

   The commission emailed an outside organization a summary of its survey on antitrust compliance in cooperatives (published in June 2020). It sent the same file to other recipients on August 28 and September 7, in total two organizations and one business. [1] [2]

2. 2021-02-24

   The general affairs division checked the file and found that it contained personal data collected in the survey. [1]

3. 2021-02-25

   The commission asked the recipients by phone to delete the file. [1]

4. 2021-02-26

   The commission announced the case. [1]

5. 2021-03-01

   It repeated the request to the recipients and reported to and apologized to respondents by post and email. [1]

The charts in the file had the source spreadsheet embedded. It could not be seen by merely opening the file, but clicking a chart showed titles, names, phone numbers, email addresses and survey answers of 1,381 contacts at 1,248 cooperatives and other organizations. [1] [2]

The commission will take measures to prevent a recurrence and strengthen training and its management system. [1]