AU: How paper created a vulnerability for cyber criminals to steal 186,000 people’s data

Lucy Cormack reports:

When the personal data of 186,000 people was breached in a phishing attack on Service NSW in March, the weakness cyber criminals were able to exploit was actually paper.

Passports, banking and Medicare details were potentially exposed in photocopied and scanned paper documents stored inside the email accounts of 47 Service NSW employees, which were targeted in the attack.

Read more on The Sydney Morning Herald.

I’m not so sure blaming paper is appropriate. Isn’t the real problem that you’re storing PII in email accounts that are not adequately secured?