"The bug affected HMCTS's civil, family, and tribunal services with a particular impact on the Social Security and Child Support (SSCS) Tribunal, which hears appeals against government benefit payment decisions. Sackman said it was caused by a faulty interaction between a case management system and the core case database. "This technical issue had the potential to cause some documents and data fields to be hidden from view in certain cases across civil, family, and tribunal jurisdictions," she said."
"In August, the BBC published material from an internal whistleblower investigation on the bug. Sources within HMCTS compared the situation to the Horizon Post Office scandal, with one telling the broadcaster: "They're not worried about risk to the public, they're worried about people finding out about the risk to the public. It's terrifying to witness." The BBC reported that initially HMCTS investigated just 109 of 609 SSCS cases identified as having potential issues with just one having a "potentially significant impact.""
"Sackman said that the issue was of "very low incidence" and that investigations to date had found no evidence of impact on case outcomes. However, she added: "Further assurance work is ongoing." HMCTS identified the bug in 2023 and applied fixes in January 2025. It carried out targeted investigations into whether the bug had affected case outcomes, but has since "significantly expanded" this with additional ongoing work on SSCS cases, according to Sackman."
HM Courts and Tribunals Service is checking whether an IT bug that could hide documents and data affected the outcome of any cases. Investigations to date found no evidence of impact on case outcomes, and further assurance work is ongoing. The bug affected civil, family, and tribunal services, with particular impact on the Social Security and Child Support (SSCS) Tribunal, and was caused by a faulty interaction between a case management system and the core case database. The issue was identified in 2023, fixes were applied in January 2025, and targeted investigations have been expanded, especially for SSCS cases. Family public law risk was lower because local authorities supply documents directly to courts. Internal whistleblower material was published and initial targeted reviews examined a subset of identified SSCS cases.
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