Ashley Madison hack: First British divorce case could begin after infidelity site leak

Family lawyers have been contacted by several individuals seeking advice since details of the hack first emerged

Online internet forums have been also been inundated with requests for help to access the full set of data ( Carl Court/Getty Images)

The first British divorce case following the leak of millions of personal records from the Ashley Madison infidelity website is almost certainly underway.

Family lawyers have been contacted by several individuals seeking advice since details of the hack first emerged, according to the Times.

Some firms have claimed to be receiving around three calls a day from anxious individuals who have discovered their partners' details among the leaked data.

The hackers, a group that calls itself Team Impact, followed through this week with their promise to release users' private information including their names, email addresses, phone numbers and home addresses.

The data dump of 9.7 gigabytes, posted on Tuesday, can be downloaded by anyone; however the site is only accessible on the “dark web” through the private Tor browser.

Nigel Shepherd, a partner at the family law firm Mills & Reeve told theTimes that a married woman had contacted the firm for legal advice after finding her partner’s personal information among the leaked accounts.

If the divorce proceedings go through they will be the first in Britain linked to the site.

Shoosmiths law firm told the newspaper that they are expecting more people to get in touch with them for advice now that the information has been released.

Online internet forums such as survivinginfadelity.com have been also been inundated with requests for help to access the full set of data.

One user said: “My DH's email is on AM. But I don't know to what extent. He has a history of online cheating. I need to know. Thanks.”

Over 32 million members of the site have had their details revealed by hackers. Of these, 1.2 million people are believed to be British.

Emails sent by the founder of the infidelity website also appear to have been exposed this week in a second, larger release of data stolen from its parent company, according to Reuters.

The move appears to be a retort to the company's initial response that the data dump released on Tuesday may not be authentic.

Launched in 2001, the Ashley Madison website, owned by Canadian company Avid Life Media (ALM) has been labelled the “Google of cheating”. Its tagline is ‘Life is short. Have an affair.’