Jeremy Clarkson once published his bank account number and sort code to prove that the information couldn't be used to steal money. Someone used it to set up a monthly direct debit from his bank account to a charity.
Clarkson's Bank Details Backfire: Charity Gets £500
In 2008, Jeremy Clarkson decided to make a point about privacy paranoia. The UK government had just lost the personal records of 25 million people in the child benefit data scandal, and Clarkson thought everyone was overreacting. To prove his point, he published his bank account number and sort code in his Sun newspaper column.
"All you'll be able to do with them is put money into my account," he wrote confidently. "Not take it out."
Famous Last Words
Someone took this as a challenge. Within days, a direct debit had been set up from Clarkson's account to Diabetes UK for £500. The charity confirmed they'd received the donation and thanked him for his "generosity."
Clarkson later admitted in his column: "I was wrong and I have been punished for my mistake." The irony was almost too perfect—he'd tried to demonstrate that bank details were useless for fraud, and someone had immediately proven him spectacularly wrong.
How It Actually Works
Here's what most people don't realize about UK banking: while you can't directly withdraw money with just an account number and sort code, you can absolutely set up a direct debit. The Direct Debit system relies on trust and after-the-fact verification rather than upfront authorization.
What you can do with someone's bank details:
- Set up direct debits (as Clarkson discovered)
- Make deposits into their account
- Create standing orders in some cases
- Potentially use them for identity theft as supporting information
The Direct Debit Guarantee does protect account holders—you can get unauthorized payments refunded—but it's still a hassle nobody wants to deal with.
The Bigger Picture
This wasn't just funny because Clarkson got pranked. It highlighted a genuine security vulnerability in the UK banking system that many people didn't understand. Publishing your bank details is objectively a bad idea, even if the risk isn't quite what people imagine.
The person who set up the direct debit could have been prosecuted for fraud, but they chose a charity donation rather than personal gain. That legal gray area—combined with the sheer comedy of someone using Clarkson's own money to prove him wrong—meant no charges were ever filed.
To his credit, Clarkson owned the mistake. He used the incident in future columns as an example of his own foolishness, and the £500 went to a good cause. But the lesson remained: when it comes to financial security, overconfidence and bank details make a terrible combination.