Man sentenced for illegally collecting motorists’ personal data

Jonathan Riches, a 46-year-old United Kingdom national, has been found guilty of unlawfully accessing personal data of motorists’ details from the Enterprise Rent-A-Car database.

He committed this offense between 2009 and 2011. Riches used to work for Enterprise Rent-A-Car, but left the company in 2009 to set up his own personal injury firm.

Ever since he quit, Riches kept in touch with his former colleagues. Through this he was able to illegally obtain the personal information of Enterprise Rent-A-Car customers involved in road traffic accidents. He would contact them offering legal services.

Thanks to the help of his accomplices, Riches was able to access the entire internal Enterprise Rent-A-Car database, allowing him to look up contact information and other personal details of potential clients.

The court previously ordered the suspect to pay his former employer a £300,000 settlement. Instead of appearing in court in 2016, Riches decided to flee to the United States. In 2024 he returned to the United Kingdom and surrendered himself to the authorities.

A judge sentenced the man to pay a £10,000 fine, plus £1,700 in legal costs, for unlawfully accessing motorists’ personal information. He has to pay the settlement within a year, or he will be subjected to a custodial sentence of nine months.

Riches’ accomplices were all previously sentenced.

Andy Curry, head of the investigation department of the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), is pleased that justice has been served. “Mr. Riches spearheaded a brazen operation, through his accomplices illegally accessing Enterprise Rent-A-Car systems in order to steal data which he then used to enrich himself to the tune of hundreds of thousands of pounds,” he said in a statement.