On 21 January 2026, Brief received a letter to the editor from Mr Grahame Young of Francis Burt Chambers. In response, we contacted the Board seeking clarification on the issues raised in Mr Young’s letter.
Both Mr Young’s letter and the Board’s response are published below.
We understand that, following our enquiry, the Board has also responded in writing to Mr Young.
Letter from Grahame Young, 21 January 2026
On 3 December 2025, more than six months after the original cyber incident, the Legal Practice Board advised me by email that some information of a sensitive and/or personal nature relevant to me was involved, which may have included details relating to one or more of the following:
- religious beliefs or affiliations;
- philosophical beliefs;
- sexual preferences or practices;
- criminal record;
- misconduct or complaints;
- other sensitive information.
The Board said this information was provided to and/or produced by the Board in the course of its regulatory or statutory functions.
It is clear from the email that the Board has collected and retains information of the kind listed concerning practitioners.
I responded the following day saying, among other things, that I could not conceive that my religious beliefs and affiliations, philosophical beliefs and sexual preferences or practices could have any relevance whatever to the Board’s functions. It was baffling, to say the least, why the Board would collect and retain such information in relation to any practitioner.
I requested deletion of any such information, or for the Board to justify its practices.
As at the time of writing (on 21 January 2026) the only response received has been an automated reply: “Thank you for your email. Your query is important to us and we will endeavour to respond to this email as soon as possible. We thank you for your patience.”
I consider it important that practitioners know that the Board collects and retains such information concerning practitioners. I expect most will be as appalled as I am.
In the absence of any substantive response, I now call on the Board to permanently delete all such information and confirm that has been done, and if not, to publicly justify its position.
Yours sincerely,
John “Grahame” Young
Response from John Syminton, Chair of the Legal Practice Board, 29 January 2026
The notification letters that were issued to all impacted individuals were tailored for the wide cohort of individuals who were involved in the incident based on the nature of information impacted. The nature of the information varied covering a wide array of cases and circumstances. As you can appreciate, due to the scale and complexity of the Cyber Incident and the number of practitioners impacted, the Board provided notification to individuals based on a classification of the type of information impacted.
As such, the information outlined in these statements are a general indication of the types of information that the Board may hold in the exercise of its statutory functions. These include investigating complaints against legal practitioners and assessing matters relevant to admission eligibility.
We wish to assure legal practitioners that the Board have taken all reasonable steps to investigate and mitigate any damage that may have been caused as a result of this cyber incident and our support in this matter is ongoing.
Additionally, the Board has gone to significant effort to communicate frequently with legal practitioners on our progress in these efforts.
We continue to have sophisticated monitoring in place to detect any dark web activity, with the support of external experts. We also have an injunction in place to prevent any access, dissemination or sharing of data impacted by this incident.
Do you have thoughts? Let us know at brief@lawsocietywa.asn.au.
