A whistleblower who first raised the alarm with former Wells MP James Heappey about a serious Ministry of Defence data breach says she was silenced by a secret court injunction — preventing her from warning Afghan nationals at risk of Taliban reprisals.

The breach, which took place in 2022, involved the accidental disclosure of personal details of nearly 25,000 people who had applied to the UK's Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy (ARAP) scheme. Many had worked with British forces in Afghanistan and were at high risk of retaliation.

Mr Heappey, who served as Armed Forces Minister at the time, has since described the breach as "gut-wrenching" and admitted: "On this breach, we let the country down badly."

The full scale of the leak only became public in July 2025 after the High Court lifted a super-injunction that had prevented any reporting of the incident for nearly two years. The court order was originally granted in September 2023 on national security grounds.

Person A, an independent caseworker helping Afghan families reach safety, told The Telegraph that she first discovered the breach in August 2023 after an anonymous Facebook user posted what appeared to be genuine applicant details and claimed to have the full database.

She said she contacted Mr Heappey on 15 August 2023, warning in an email: "The Taliban may well now have a 33,000-long kill list – essentially provided to them by the UK government." She also warned: "If any of these families are murdered, the Government will be liable."

According to Person A, she did not receive a response to the email. However, after expressing concerns on social media — without revealing any classified details — she was contacted by officials and invited to a virtual meeting.

She believed the meeting would be a debriefing. Instead, she says, she was asked to confirm she was alone and not recording, and was then informed that she was being served with a super-injunction. The order prohibited her from discussing the breach, even with the other volunteer caseworkers she worked alongside.

"I didn't even know super-injunctions existed," she said. "I was afraid to Google it. I had no lawyer. I thought I was going to be helping – not being silenced."

At that stage, she said she had managed to reach 65 of the families she supported. The injunction, she said, meant she could no longer warn the rest.

The Ministry of Defence has not publicly commented on Person A's account. It has previously said the injunction was necessary to protect the safety of those named in the breach. The individual responsible for the original error was not dismissed but was reassigned within the department.

Mr Heappey, who represented Wells from 2015 until 2024, responded publicly after the injunction was lifted, posting a series of statements on social media. He said: "The worst part… was the mortal danger we feared this breach presented to applicants… If the Taliban got their hands on the list, violent and even lethal reprisal was likely."

He added: "MOD was magnificent in response to it all. But on this breach, we let the country down badly."

The leak led to the creation of a secret government scheme, the Afghanistan Response Route, to relocate those affected. The scheme is understood to have cost the taxpayer more than £400 million so far, with an eventual estimate of £850 million. Some unverified projections place the full cost of Afghan relocations at over £7 billion.

Some former ministers, including Suella Braverman and Robert Jenrick, have claimed they opposed the creation of the scheme. Mr Heappey has disputed those claims, saying there was no "fierce opposition" at the time and that ministers followed legal advice.

The Intelligence and Security Committee has called for full access to all assessments related to the breach, and the Defence Committee is expected to question former ministers in due course. Mr Heappey has said he would be "happy to contribute" to any inquiry.

At the time of publication, Mr Heappey had not responded directly to Person A's claims, and the Ministry of Defence had issued no further comment.