According to a Daily Mail investigation, private financial information is being sold by firms without customers’ knowledge.
The claims have been made that information regarding people’s salaries, investment values and pension size are being sold for as little as 5p and without consent.
The data has the potential to unlock avenues for fraudsters and scams to target pensioners, who will be able to access their full pension savings from April.
Information Commissioner, Christopher Graham, said to the BBC: "There are lots of people out there who are trying to take advantage of leads that they get to sell you stuff."
"In this particular area with large sums of money at stake because of pensions liberalisation, the very simple message is don’t take big financial decisions on the back of a phone call."
According to the Daily Mail investigation, Nick Sayer, one director of firm B2C Data, allegedly boasted of the access he had to customers’ data, before selling information to an undercover reporter.
These actions could be a breach of the Data Protection Act and is being investigated by the Information Commission Office.
