Five people who made £7,000 from leaking more than 700 pieces of confidential data from Allianz Insurance using the WhatsApp messaging service have been sentenced for bribery offences.

An investigation by detectives from the City of London Police’s Insurance Fraud Enforcement Department (IFED) found that three Allianz company employees had been individually approached and told they could be paid to leak confidential customer information.

Sajaad Nawaz and Shaiad Nawaz approached Kayleigh Underhill, Andrew Clarke and Reace Bowen who all worked at Allianz Insurance and persuaded them to hand over information regarding Allianz  Insurance customers who been involved in collisions - the information was then sent by the brothers to claims management companies.

Sajaad Nawaz, 36, from Brays Road, Birmingham, West Midlands pleaded guilty at a mention hearing at Birmingham Crown Court in May 2017 and was sentenced on Tuesday (22 August 2017). His brother Shaiad Nawaz age 34, from Eastcote Road, Acocks Green, Birmingham, was sentenced on Wednesday (23 August 2017) following a trial at Birmingham Crown Court. Sajaad Nawaz- sentenced to four months imprisonment suspended for 15 months. Shaiad Nawaz received six months imprisonment suspended for 15 months and 20 days of rehabilitation activity.

Kayleigh Underhill, 26, of  Laxton Grove, Solihull, West Midland, Andrew Clarke, 24 , of Elmbridge Drive, Solihull, West Midlands, Reace Bowen,23, from Birmingham, West Midlands all pleaded guilty in February and were sentenced on 7 April 2017 at Birmingham Crown Court.

They received the following sentences:
• Kayleigh Underhill - 12 months imprisonment suspended for 18 months and received a rehabilitation order. She was also ordered to pay 
£1050 compensation to Allianz Insurance.
• Andrew Clarke - 8 months imprisonment suspended for 18 months and a community order. He was ordered to pay £150 compensation to Allianz Insurance.
• Reace Bowen - 8 months imprisonment suspended for 18 months plus a community order. Also ordered to pay £300 to Allianz Insurance 

All have also been ordered to pay £540 costs to the court.

The group’s criminal activity came to light when a report was made to Action Fraud, the national fraud reporting centre for fraud and cyber crime on 10 November 2015. The report was referred to IFED which used information from the report to identify the five offenders. Ms Underhill, Mr Clarke and Mr Bowen all worked at the same insurance firm and were found to be accepting bribes for customer data from the Nawaz brothers.

Detectives were able to gather evidence to show that Underhill, Clarke and Bowen had regular contact with the brothers via WhatsApp. While at work they would they would write customer data on their notepads, take photographs of this and then pass the information via WhatsApp to both Nawaz brothers. They would also discuss payment for this information in their WhatsApp conversations.

Ms Underhill, Mr Bowen and Mr Clarke received approximately £250 per week for the information and their engagement with the bribers. In total, the trio leaked over 700 pieces of customer data and made over £7,000 by doing so. Once passed to claims management companies the customers were cold called and persuaded to commence a personal injury claim.

Detective Constable Daryl Fryatt, who led the case for the City of London Police’s Insurance Fraud Enforcement Department, said: “It is a criminal offence to leak customer data and any employee who is considering doing this should think twice.”