Member's statement: PSNI Data Breach

Member's statement by Mr Paul Frew on 9 February 2026.

MLA: Mr Paul Frew
Party at the time: Democratic Unionist Party
Date: 9 February 2026
Type: Member's statement
Business: Members' Statements
Heading: PSNI Data Breach
Assembly identifier: Official Report component 5369057

Text

Mr Speaker, thank you for your grace this morning. The PSNI data breach in 2023 was deeply concerning and still causes massive distress to those affected and, of course, their families. The breach has added an additional level of threat to all police officers who still need to utilise the utmost vigilance because of an evil and sophisticated terrorist threat. There must be robust safeguards in place across all parts of the justice system to ensure that lessons have been learned and that officers' safety is never inadvertently compromised. We in the Chamber, the public and serving and retired police officers need to be assured that appropriate procedures are being followed and that any necessary changes are made to prevent a recurrence.
The breach has cost taxpayers and ratepayers £119 million, but think of the cost for officers and their families having to move home, move area and move station. They have had upset and upheaval, and they have to constantly look over their shoulder and always be careful. That applies to the police officer and their 10-year-old son or daughter. It is up to the Justice Minister to make sure that we in the House, in particular, police officers and the public alike all have confidence in the justice system. I call on the Justice Minister to reinstate confidence in the justice system, which is probably at its lowest ebb. That is on the Justice Minister. The buck stops with the Justice Minister and no one else.

248 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers met the documented threshold for “not flagged”.

Overall probability that the activity is being used to promote, exploit or escalate an identity-based controversy: 0.09 (flagging needs at least 0.70; at or below 0.30 is not flagged).
None of the five culture-war criteria was met (each was below 0.60).
Assessed as legitimate policy scrutiny (0.84).
No identity-based framing was identified (0.97).
The overall probability was at or below the not-flagging threshold.

This is an AI-generated assessment of the text, made against published criteria. It is not a finding of fact about the MLA or their intentions. The Assembly record itself is the fact.

Jev’s structured answers

Probability that each statement is true of this text (0 = no, 1 = yes). A criterion counts as met at 0.60 or above.
Question	Probability	Met?
Identity framing	0.04	No
Sectarian or communal antagonism	0.03	No
Cultural grievance politics	0.02	No
Dog-whistle messaging	0.04	No
Controversy escalation	0.06	No
Legitimate policy scrutiny	0.84	Yes
Overall judgement	0.09	At or below not-flagging threshold

Context and attribution (stance)
Option	Probability
No identity-based framing (chosen)	0.97
Reports or questions it	0.00
Criticises or condemns it	0.01
Adopts it	0.02

Subject area (top five)
Subject	Probability
No identity-related subject	0.53
Legacy of the Troubles, victims and paramilitarism	0.35
Another identity-related subject	0.07
Sexism, misogyny, ageism and other equality groups	0.03
Gender, sexuality, abortion and related social issues	0.01

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 14:31 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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