lists of suspected British file sharers has been leaked online.

Personal information on more than 8,000 UK internet users accused of having downloaded music or movies illegally on the Internet have appeared online. The British law firm ACS: Law chasing file sharers in the UK in collaboration with music and film industry, but now ACS: Law, even at risk of being sentenced to pay fines and damages since the lists of suspected pirates have leaked online.
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The law firm is known and notorious for sending threatening letters to UK internet users with demands for compensation for file sharing, and it has apparently been users of the anarchic internet forum 4chan to launch a counterattack against the company. A list of names of 5,300 people who are accused of piracy of adult films, showed up on Pirate Bay after an attack on the ACS: Law's Web site yesterday.

The list is only a small part of a larger package of 1,000 confidential emails from the law firm. Now, the unknown assailants then published a new list with 8,000 names of broadband subscribers with Sky, which apparently was stolen at the law firm. The BBC has spoken to several of the persons listed, who deny they are guilty of piracy.

The British Information Commissioner has gone into the matter and inform the ACS: Law may risk a fine of up to five million dollars because you have neglected to protect user data. Excel documents containing personal information are not even protected with encryption.