Confirmation that personal details of police officers and staff released in a major data breach by the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) is now in the hands of dissident Republicans has left police officers based in Fermanagh feeling “vulnerable”.

Chief Constable Simon Byrne said earlier this week that he believed that dissident Republicans would use the information to “intimidate and target” his officers.

His comments came after documents containing information from the breach were posted on a wall near a Sinn Féin office in Belfast.

Speaking to The Impartial Reporter on Tuesday (August 15), a police officer based in Fermanagh said that “police at this point are not surprised that happened”.

“We obviously thought our details would be secure,” said the officer, adding: “I can’t even access [internal information about] the people in my team so it’s baffling [that] one click, and all our details are out there.

‘We are vulnerable’

“We feel [that] down in Fermanagh, we are vulnerable as it’s so rural – we all live in the area, apart from a few.”

Last week, the PSNI revealed a document had mistakenly been shared online which included the names of about 10,000 officers and staff.

Details released included the surname and first initial of every employee, their rank or grade, where they are based, and the unit they work in.

During a press conference in Belfast, Chief Constable Byrne said that he was confident that information on police officers and staff mistakenly released in a major data breach is in the hands of dissidents.

He said: “I would like to confirm the picture in relation to last week’s breach continues to evolve at pace. We are now confident that the workforce dataset is in the hands of dissident Republicans. It is, therefore, a planning assumption that they will use this list to generate fear and uncertainty as well as intimidating or targeting officers and staff.”

The Chief Constable said the PSNI is “working around the clock” to assess the risk to staff.

“We have measures in place to reassure and advise our workforce of what this risk means for them. We will continue to liaise with the policing board and the UK government as well as other partners as we develop our response to this matter.”

The Fermanagh-based police officer has said that PSNI officers and staff have been told to add their names to a list which the Police Federation will pursue on their behalf.

‘Knocked confidence’

“But I know a lot of people have gone private,” said the officer, adding that the data breach has “really knocked people’s confidence in the Chief Constable”.

“I’d say so many will push [for] their retirements, so many are off on sick and will go off, and the rest of us will suffer as we are already short [staffed].

“A lot of officers have been deemed ‘high-risk’ and so measures have been put in place to safeguard them. But the issue is, we say we are stressed and need off work, we lose our guns, and then [we] are even more vulnerable.

“It’s a Catch 22 [situation]. The emails now are about stopping it happening again, and less acknowledgement of the incident,” the police officer told this newspaper.