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The Independent
5 days ago
- Politics
- The Independent
Chaos and fear as Afghans exposed in huge data breach left in limbo by UK
When the email from the Ministry of Defence dropped into his inbox, Qargha's heart leapt. After an agonising four-year wait, he hoped that this would finally be confirmation that he could escape the threat of the Taliban and be brought to safety in the UK. Instead, it was news that the government had exposed his personal information – and kept him in the dark about it for nearly two years. Already in fear for his life, he will now take extra precautions even when going for a walk or shopping. He is one of around 18,700 Afghans whose names and contact details were exposed in the catastrophic data leak, which happened when an MoD official emailed a secret database to trusted contacts in February 2022. The blunder, which has resulted in some 16,000 Afghans affected by the breach being relocated to Britain as part of a covert operation, was discovered after someone posted parts of the database online in August 2023. News of the breach prompted the government to use an unprecedented superinjunction to keep the breach a secret in an attempt to block further spread of the information, meaning that even those affected could not be told. Ministers had argued that 100,000 people's lives were at risk of Taliban reprisals if news of the data breach got out, but a government-commissioned review later concluded that being identified on the dataset was unlikely to constitute sole grounds for targeting. Just before the gagging order was finally lifted on Tuesday, the MoD scrambled to email tens of thousands of Afghans, warning them their data was compromised. Desperate for news that MoD caseworkers had finally made a decision on his case, Qargha, a former member of the Afghan security forces who is still in Afghanistan, thought the email would finally confirm his eligibility approval. But he was shocked when he discovered the truth. He told The Independent: ' I am very concerned about the leak of my personal information and I understood more about it from Afghan International TV as well. They said this leak will put many lives at risk. 'My day-to-day life will be harder now. I am living in a safe house and I know that today or tomorrow, if I need to go to the hospital or seek help for anything, I will have to be more cautious now. I am putting restrictions on myself – being more cautious about going shopping, going for a walk, going to the park or going for a haircut'. The former soldier applied for sanctuary in the UK in 2021, but he was rejected along with many members of former Afghan specialist units in the summer of 2023. During that time, one UK special forces liaison officer oversaw the blanket rejection of 1,585 such applications. Qargha is waiting on a review of that decision, and the years of limbo are taking their toll as his agonising wait continues. 'My old home has already been raided twice. It is impacting me mentally, having to wait for so long. Everyone knows us and the work we did against the Taliban before the takeover, so my life is hard, stress level is up, everything is up,' he said. One former member of the Afghan special forces unit, ATF444, who served alongside the British yet left behind after the withdrawal, is also still waiting for a review of his application for help. Akthar said that after he received the two alert emails from the MoD, he had 'a lot of questions'. 'I don't understand, this is not a third-world country. This is the UK, where access to technology is high. How have they managed to leak this information?', he told The Independent. 'We are already at risk and they have put us at more risk. There are lots of questions but what can we do about it - nothing. 'Whatever caution we were taking before, we should triple that caution. At this moment, the fear is like hell. 'My moving around has become restricted a lot. Before, if I was taking 50 per cent precaution for my safety, I need to make sure I'm doing it 100 per cent,' he added. Last week, Taliban members began doing door-to-door raids of the district he was in, so he jumped in a car with a friend and drove for 12 hours to a different province, he said. He also needs to try to work to get money to support members of his family. 'It's making me desperate,' he said, adding: 'My family has not done anything to anybody and they don't deserve to die'. Another former member of the Afghan security forces said his 'stress changed to depression' on receiving the bright red warning message, alerting him that his information had been breached. 'My stress level is very high, all I can do is wait for my application to be processed,' he said. The Independent revealed on Wednesday that hundreds of Afghan special forces soldiers had had their details leaked in the MoD breach. Some 18,500 people affected by the leak have been brought to the UK or are on their way, while 5,400 have received approval letters but still need to be evacuated. Ministers have said that, while the MoD's resettlement scheme (Arap) has been closed to new applicants, existing cases will still be processed. But no time frame for the evacuations has been given, leaving those affected in limbo. An MoD spokesperson said: 'We will not comment on individual cases. 'This Government is fully committed to delivering on the pledge made by Parliament to those in Afghanistan who are eligible to relocate and resettle. 'We aim to see through our commitment to those eligible under the ARP to its completion by the end of the parliament. Eligible Afghans and their families will continue to arrive in the UK for the foreseeable future.'
The Independent
17-07-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
‘We were lucky to escape Afghanistan alive - nine months later, we're still waiting to be brought to safety'
Rayan and his family have spent the past 271 days staring at the same four walls of their cramped and sparse hotel room in Pakistan. They were found eligible for sanctuary in the UK due to his father's former service alongside the British special forces nine months ago - but they are still waiting, in fear for their long-term safety, to be brought to the UK. On Tuesday, along with thousands of others, he received an email from the Ministry of Defence warning him that due to a data loss in 2022, 'some of the personal data associated with this email address may have been compromised'. As he typed the family's application reference number into the government's checking system, a bright red warning sign flashed up alerting him that they were affected by the huge Afghan data leak, which has seen the names and contact information of 18,700 people with links to British forces being shared 'in error'. The catastrophic breach of Afghan applications to the MoD's resettlement scheme was inadvertently shared by a member of the armed forces, potentially putting 100,000 people at risk of reprisals from the Taliban. Learning that the leak could have put his family at risk was 'an awful experience', he told The Independent. The Taliban had already burnt down their family home and arrested some family members because of his father's previous role. Now he is desperate to know the answer to one urgent question - when will they be brought to safety? The need to leave Pakistan is a pressing one. Three months ago the family were arrested by Pakistani police and taken to a deportation centre, sparing fears they would be returned to once again face their fate at the hands of the Taliban, he said. Speaking from his hotel in Islamabad, which is being used by the UK government to house Afghans eligible for sanctuary in Britain, he said: 'We have seen 24 families go from Pakistan to the UK but our family has been waiting here. Our visas expired, and at least three times Pakistani police have tried to capture us. 'Once they arrested all of our family and took us to a deportation centre in Pakistan. It was a Sunday three months ago at around 10 o'clock. 'We were inside our rooms and the manager told us they were asking about our visas. I showed them our permissions from the British High Commission in Pakistan and they said that was unacceptable.' Rayan said he and his family were then taken to a deportation centre where they were threatened with being sent back to Afghanistan the next day. Luckily, he was able to pay a police officer to use his phone and, after several attempts, was able to get through to their caseworker, who could confirm their eligibility to be there. 'After around 30 hours, a diplomat came from the British High Commission and we were allowed out,' he said. In total, 16 members of his family are now sharing three hotel rooms as they wait for relocation. Two babies have been born in the time that they have spent in limbo in Pakistan, one now aged four months old and the other now seven months old. Each room has only a single bed, he said, meaning the rest of the family is forced to sleep on mattresses on the floor. With no money and after their belongings were lost to the fire, they have had to rely on the kindness of others to get by. 'When our children were born, we asked our caseworker if they could help with some supplies for them. We told them that our house had been burned down by the Taliban and we didn't have any money. The weather was really cold in Pakistan and we didn't have the money to buy things for our child. 'Unfortunately, we had to go to the other Afghan families, who helped us with some clothes for our daughter. They were a big size, but we didn't have any other choice'. When he first received the email from the MoD's Afghan caseworker team on Tuesday, he hoped it would bring news that the family were finally being brought to safety. But he was wrong. 'At the moment, we are in fear of emails from the UK, we are afraid that they would reject us. I saw it said that some data had been released. The second email said we could check if our data had been breached. 'When I checked it, I found that our data was linked. It was a really awful experience. I feel like a ball in a football pitch with everyone kicking us from one side to the other'. And yet there is still no end in sight for the family, who now face a continued agonising wait to find out when they can come to the UK. The Ministry of Defence have been contacted for comment.
