Written question asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Labour) on Tuesday, 19 May 2026, in the House of Lords. It was due for an answer on Wednesday, 3 June 2026. It was answered by Baroness Merron (Labour) on Monday, 8 June 2026 on behalf of the Department of Health and Social Care.

UK Biobank

Question: To ask His Majesty's Government whether UK Biobank conducted any audits of the number of research publications based on its data authored entirely by researchers who were not approved under its access procedures; and if so, what estimate has been made of the number of such publications.

Answer: UK Biobank is a charity and operationally independent of government. The Government has been working closely with UK Biobank in its response to the data breach which it reported to the Government on 20 April 2026. Measures taken so far have included the suspension of access to their research analysis platform, revocation of access permissions from the institutions involved, rapid removal of the listings from the e-commerce platform, self‑referral to the Information Commissioners Office, and urgent work to introduce technical barriers to prevent download of participant‑level data.

Secondary information