Three people have been arrested over an allegedly fraudulent sale of road crash victims' data to a claims management company, the City of London Police revealed today. 

The force said its insurance fraud enforcement department took action after insurer LV= referred suspicions that, between January and December 2014, an employee had unlawfully passed information on 50 collision victims to a CMC in exchange for payments totalling close to £17,000. 

According to the statement, the victims reported being contacted by a person they believed worked for LV= and subsequently their claims for personal injuries, vehicle repairs and courtesy cars being dealt with by a CMC.

They said they had received payouts from the claims management company for their claims. But the police statement said the payouts were up to 40% lower than the amount LV= had paid out for each claim.

A 22-year-old woman and a 64-year-old man, both claims management company employees, have been arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to commit bribery and money laundering.

Meanwhile, a 24-year-old former employee of LV= was arrested at his home in the Poole area on suspicion of fraud by abuse of position. He was later released on police bail until September.

Detective constable Kate Sibley, who is leading the investigation, said: 'Illegitimately selling or buying an insurer’s confidential customer information is a criminal offence. 

'This operation should send a strong message to anyone thinking of committing this type of fraud – insurers are working with the insurance fraud enforcement department to root you out and you will feel the full force of the law.'

Martin Milliner, claims director at LV= said: 'We work closely with the department and as soon as we suspected one of our employees was liaising inappropriately with a claims management company we referred the matter.'