A secondary school has confirmed an email containing information about its students was “inadvertently” sent to parents.

The Leigh Academies Trust, which runs The Hundred of Hoo Academy, in Hoo, is investigating how the “mishap” happened.

The email sent to parents and carers on Wednesday afternoon (May 22) was supposed to share details about the upcoming end-of-year celebrations.

However, it instead contained an attachment with unauthorised data including names of students and other specifics about them which was not meant for external distribution.

In a statement, a spokesperson said: “Leigh Academies Trust takes the privacy and security of our students’ information with utmost seriousness.

“Immediately upon learning of this incident, our IT and data protection teams were mobilised to assess the situation.”

KentOnline was told the attachment included students’ full names, attendance figures, positive and negative comments and whether the child was entitled to pupil premium.

When these allegations were put to the trust they confirmed it did include their names but did not have any contact details, financial information, or any other sensitive personal data.

The spokesperson said to prevent “further unauthorised access and to understand the breadth of the mishap” it has recalled the “misdirected” email and is confirming it has been deleted from all recipients.

The trust has also referred the incident to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) and is conducting an internal review and audit to strengthen its data handling processes.

The spokesperson added: “Leigh Academies Trust is committed to not only addressing this incident but also to learning from this occurrence to further improve our data management practices.

“We are reviewing and enhancing our training and procedures around data security to better safeguard the information entrusted to us.

“We apologise to our students and their families for any concern this may have caused.

“We understand the importance of maintaining the trust placed in us to provide a safe and secure learning environment and are making every effort to ensure such an error does not happen again.”

An ICO spokesperson said: “Leigh Academies Trust has made us aware of an incident and we are assessing the information provided.”

The Hundred of Hoo Academy, in Main Road, is a four to 18 mixed all-through school with a sixth form.