14
Actions in this sector
6% of the register
8 of 20
Rank by volume
sectors on the register
1
Monetary penalties
1 with a published figure
£350,000
Penalties published
largest: Ministry of Defence
2022 to 2026
Span on the register
4 years
What the register shows for this sector
Central government accounts for 14 of the 216 actions on the register (6%), which makes it the 8th most heavily represented of the 20 sectors the ICO uses. The commonest action here is the reprimand, at 12 of 14 (86%). Most actions here name UK GDPR (9 of 14). 2 organisations appear more than once: Ministry of Defence (2), Secretary of State for the Home Department (Home Office) (2).
01Largest penalties in Central government
| # | Organisation | Date | Action | Law | Penalty |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ministry of Defence | 26 Feb 2024 | Monetary penalty | UK GDPR | £350,000 |
By action type
- Reprimand12 (86%)
- Monetary penalty1 (7%)
- Enforcement notice1 (7%)
By law
- UK GDPR9 (64%)
- Not stated4 (29%)
- Data Protection Act 20181 (7%)
02Every Central government action
| Organisation | Date | Action | Law | Penalty |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ACRO Criminal Records Office | 7 Aug 2026 | Reprimand | UK GDPR | - |
| The Electoral Commission | 9 May 2024 | Reprimand | Not stated | - |
| Home Office | 21 Mar 2024 | Enforcement notice | UK GDPR | - |
| Ministry of Defence | 26 Feb 2024 | Monetary penalty | UK GDPR | £350,000 |
| Executive Office | 21 Jul 2023 | Reprimand | UK GDPR | - |
| Ministry of Justice | 27 Apr 2023 | Reprimand | UK GDPR | - |
| Department for Education | 2 Nov 2022 | Reprimand | UK GDPR | - |
| Department for Work and Pensions | 31 Oct 2022 | Reprimand | UK GDPR | - |
| Secretary of State for the Home Department | 7 Oct 2022 | Reprimand | Not stated | - |
| Secretary of State for the Home Department (Home Office) | 21 Sep 2022 | Reprimand | Not stated | - |
| Secretary of State for the Home Department (Home Office) | 16 Aug 2022 | Reprimand | UK GDPR | - |
| Crown Prosecution Service | 12 Aug 2022 | Reprimand | Data Protection Act 2018 | - |
| Ministry of Defence | 27 Jul 2022 | Reprimand | Not stated | - |
| Department of Health and Social Care | 11 Jul 2022 | Reprimand | UK GDPR | - |
03Other sectors
Sector not stated
35
actions, £14,820,000 in penalties
Marketing
28
actions, £1,180,000 in penalties
Criminal justice
26
actions, £816,000 in penalties
General business
20
actions, £5,990,000 in penalties
Local government
20
actions
Finance, insurance and credit
19
actions, £410,000 in penalties
Health
15
actions
Central government
14
actions, £350,000 in penalties
Utilities
11
actions, £1,243,900 in penalties
Online technology and telecoms
7
actions, £28,648,373 in penalties
Retail and manufacture
5
actions, £140,000 in penalties
Charitable and voluntary
4
actions, £25,500 in penalties
Education and childcare
3
actions
Legal
2
actions
Transport and leisure
2
actions
Land or property services
1
action
Media
1
action
Political
1
action
Regulators
1
action
Social care
1
action
04Sector analysis elsewhere on the site
GDPR fines by industry
Which sectors draw the largest fines across the EEA and the UK, and the violations that drive them.
Violation types
Consent, security, transparency and transfers: what regulators actually penalise.
The full ICO register
All 216 published ICO enforcement actions, by year, sector and law.
Provenance and independence
Source: ICO enforcement register (ico.org.uk/action-weve-taken/enforcement/), as published on 4 September 2026. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
GDPRFine.com is an independent tracker of ICO enforcement. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by or connected to the Information Commissioner's Office, and it uses no ICO branding. Where the ICO's own wording is reproduced it is quoted and attributed; everything else on these pages is our own summary of the published record.
The ICO's register held 222 entries on that date. 6 of them are prosecutions of named individuals, with ages and home towns in the ICO's own summary. This tracker indexes organisations, so those 6 are excluded and every count on these pages is out of 216. They remain on the ICO's own register.
An entry says what the Commissioner did on the date shown. It is not a statement about the organisation today, and the ICO can amend or remove a register entry at any time. Amounts and provisions are as published by the ICO; where the published notice does not state a figure or name a provision, these pages say so rather than filling the gap.
Register: ico.org.uk/action-weve-taken/enforcement/. Corrections: questions@gdprfine.com.