Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, with reference to the Defence Recruitment System data breach on 14 March 2022, for what reason the Defence Recruitment System not taken down until 16 March 2022.

The Army places the highest importance on the security of its data and the data of those who may wish to apply to join.

Following the discovery of the unauthorised disclosure of personally identifiable information pertaining to Army recruitment candidates, the Army initiated an urgent security investigation to understand exactly what had happened, including the extent of the incident. The decision to take the Defence Recruitment System offline was made at the earliest opportunity, following all of the necessary steps to validate the compromised data set and understand the possible causes of the data leak.