Matthew Heller writes: After nearly six years of litigation, an Idaho jury will now hear a high-stakes case that pits child protection laws against the right of a couple to decide whether their infant daughter should have a spinal tap test for meningitis. The long-awaited trial will focus on a critical five-hour period which began…
Author: Dissent
Apple’s Worst Security Breach: 114,000 iPad Owners Exposed
Ryan Tate writes: Apple has suffered another embarrassment. A security breach has exposed iPad owners including dozens of CEOs, military officials, and top politicians. They—and every other buyer of the wireless-enabled tablet—could be vulnerable to spam marketing and malicious hacking. […] The specific information exposed in the breach included subscribers’ email addresses, coupled with an…
UK: Data Protection Act is out of kilter with EU law, warns privacy lawyer
Warwick Ashford reports: The single most important change required in UK data protection regulation is to bring the law into line with European legislation, says Stewart Room, partner at law firm Field Fisher Waterhouse. Section 13 of the UK Data Protection Act (DPA) is totally out of kilter with the EU directive on personal data,…
(UPDATE) Over 21,000 affected by DentaQuest breach in March still have not been notified
Cross-posted from phiprivacy.net: From the what-took-so-long dept: On May 11, this site reported that the New Mexico Human Services Department had just revealed that a laptop theft that occurred on March 20 affected about 9,600 people. The laptop was stolen from the car of an employee of West Monroe Partners, a subcontractor for DentaQuest, the…
MO: Stacks of medical records found in dumpster outside Florissant doctor’s office
From KMOV: A dumpster outside a St. John’s doctor’s office, listed as Dr. David Brown’s, was wide open and filled with patient folders and other medical records. […] Statement from Dr. David Brown: In an effort to dispose of some files that were many years old, I made a mistake by using improper procedures for…
NY: Revenge of (fired) nerd
Jamie Schram reports on a case where no patient data is reported to have been compromised, but easily could have been because it was accessible: Never sack the tech guy — he knows your IP address. That’s the lesson a Manhattan hospital learned the hard way after a disgruntled computer geek was busted for allegedly…