The UK’s data watchdog has found “insufficient evidence” to prosecute two suspected whistleblowers over a leak to The Sun of CCTV footage showing then-Health Secretary Matt Hancock kissing his aide.
The Information Comissioner’s Office said the leaked images given to The Sun of Hancock with Gina Coladangelo were “most likely obtained by someone recording the CCTV footage screens with a mobile phone”.
It carried out search warrants to raid the homes of two suspected whistleblowers and seized six mobile phones, but none of them had the CCTV footage on them.
It therefore “found insufficient evidence to prosecute two people suspected of unlawfully obtaining and disclosing CCTV footage from the Department for Health and Social Care,” the ICO said on Wednesday.
Sun editor Victoria Newton said: “We welcome the closure of this investigation. It should never have been opened in the first place and, as we said at the time, it was an outrageous abuse of state power which risked having a chilling impact on whistleblowers and a free press.
“The investigation was overwhelmingly in the public interest, a fact acknowledged by senior figures on all sides of the political debate.
“The Sun is proud to hold those in power to account, and stand up for a free press as an instrument of democracy to inform our audiences so that they can make decisions based on trusted information.”
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