If you are running on O2 or another network that uses O2′s infrastructure (namely Tesco Mobile and giffgaff), it is likely that your mobile phone number has been transmitted to every website you have visited over the past 15 days. The Information Commissioner’s Office said it is considering whether to investigate further, although a spokesman said there was no immediate breach of the Data Protection Act. This is because the DPA does not class mobile phone numbers as personally identifiable information.

However, if you have received telemarketing text messages or calls over the last 15 days that you believe may have been caused by your mobile phone number being released, there may be grounds on which you can either cancel your contract or claim compensation.

NB: Please do not take this advice as a legal footing, I am not a lawyer. Please check with your solicitor to see if you have valid legal grounds before entering a dispute with O2.

There is an European Union directive, 2002/58/EC, that instructs under Article 13 “Member States shall take appropriate measures to ensure that, free of charge, unsolicited communications for purposes of direct marketing… are not allowed either without the consent of the subscribers concerned or in respect of subscribers who do not wish to receive these communications…”

By “communications,” this implies emails, text (SMS) messages and telephone calls. This directive means that there should be some form of legal context within the Data Protection Act on which you can claim compensation, based on what the UK government did to implement this directive. If you manage to find the clause in the DPA which covers this, please let me know.