A journalism professor in Nova Scotia says provincial legislation aimed at protecting personal health records could hinder the media because it threatens to fine or jail reporters who seek medical information. Fred Vallance-Jones, who teaches at the University of King’s College in Halifax, says he supports efforts to protect privacy of medical information. But he…
Author: Dissent
Is JCPenney Giving Your Personal Info To Strangers?
Chris Morgan of The Consumerist relays this report by a concerned J C Penney customer: My wife was contacted by a complete stranger who was able to track her down because while she was shopping on JCPenney’s site, my wife’s information appeared in place of hers in her cart (including address, etc…). People are having…
CO: Informants outed in accidental Grand Junction data release
The Associated Press reports: The names of confidential drug informants, home addresses of sheriff’s deputies and troves of other sensitive data were made public for months because of a mistake by an employee of Mesa County’s technology department, officials said. Thousands of the internal records were accessible on the Internet starting in April until the…
FL: Hampton Inn reports hacker modified customer surveys
Dennis Culver reports on a hack that probably won’t get prosecuted: The Lee County Sheriff’s Office is investigating a Thursday reported theft of intellectual property at the Hampton Inn at 11281 Summerlin Square Dr. The complainant, Esther Gayfield, told investigators an unknown suspect had hacked into the hotel’s computer system network and modified customer surveys…
Credit Cards At Risk from High-Tech Pickpockets?
Oh yeah, those RFID chips are really improving security. It’s supposed to make paying for things faster and easier – just wave your credit or debit card over a scanner and you’ve paid. But now some worry that radio frequency identification (RFID) technology is also making it easier for crooks to rip you off. Security…
(update) Holy Cross Hospital (FL) breach affected 1500
As a small update to the Holy Cross Hospital breach reported previously on this site: Holy Cross’s report to HHS indicates that 1500 patients were affected by the July 27th theft of paper records. It’s not clear why the hospital took until Dec. 2 to report the incident to HHS as it had publicly revealed…