A LEADING charity faced prosecution and fines of half a million pounds yesterday after mishandling the private information of thousands of dementia sufferers.

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) found that a group of untrained and unsupervised volunteers at the Alzheimer’s Society was handling the private information of nearly 2,000 dementia sufferers and their families.

Despite improvements over the last year, the commissioner warned that unless more was done the charity could be fined up to £500,000.

“Our investigation revealed serious deficiencies in the way the Alzheimer’s Society handles personal information,” said ICO head of enforcement Stephen Eckersley.

“Some of these have been addressed, but the extent and persistence of the charity’s failure to do as we’ve asked means we must now take more formal action.”

He praised the role of volunteers in charitable organisations but added: “In failing to ensure volunteers were properly supported, this charity showed a disappointing attitude towards looking after the very sensitive information that people trusted them with.”

For seven years a total of 15 volunteers were left to deal with NHS healthcare funding applications for people suffering with dementia without any data protection or company policy training.

The charity also suffered a 2010 office burglary in which several of its unencrypted laptops went missing.

A further hack of the Alzheimer’s Society website in 2015 left 300,000 email addresses, 60,000 home addresses and other information exposed.

The charity apologised for the lapses and reassured its benefactors that the information had not reached the public domain.

“As an organisation, we exist to support the most vulnerable in society,” said organisational development director Brett Terry.

“We take this responsibility, which includes data protection, extremely seriously.

“We want to reassure our supporters and wider stakeholders that every measure is being taken to ensure their data is kept safe.”

The charity also argued that it had informed the ICO of all its new checks.

Ninety-two-year-old poppy seller Olive Cooke killed herself last year after being swamped with requests for money by charities, including the society.

Her name was found on a list sold to charities by shadowy data firms.