Christian Falvey reports: The Office for Personal Data Protection says it has never encountered such a large-scale database of illegally collected personal data: information from 200,000 drug prescriptions a day for the last six months showing who uses what kind of medicine. And the body collecting it? The State Institute for Drug Control. What the…
Author: Dissent
Insurer Zurich loses customers’ details
Nick Collins of the Telegraph reports: Insurance giant Zurich has admitted losing the personal details of 51,000 British customers. The group said the backup tape was lost during a routine transfer to a data storage centre in South Africa in August last year. It said it had no evidence that the data had been misused,…
Local NHS Trust pledges to improve data security
Antony Sumara, the Chief Executive of Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust, has agreed to take action to comply with the Data Protection Act following a significant security breach. The breach occurred after a member of the Trust’s human resources team transferred personal information to a home computer. The information, known as a ‘Statement of Case’,…
TN: Roane State announces 11,000 employee and student Social Security numbers stolen from employee’s car
WBIR reports: Roane State Community College has announced that the names and Social Security numbers of 9,747 current or former students were on a data storage device stolen from an employee’s vehicle, along with 1,194 current/former employees’ information. The Social Security numbers alone, with no names, were also stolen for 5,036 additional current or former…
Gaping security hole turned 64,000 Time Warner cable modems into hacker prey
Tim Greene reports: A blogger helping to tune a friend’s wi-fi network uncovered a gaping security hole in Wi-Fi cable modem routers installed in 64,000 Time Warner subscribers’ homes, leaving them open to attack. Time Warner says that within the past week it has patched the problem until the manufacturer can provide a permanent fix,…
Five plead guilty in ID theft ring in Rhode Island
Eric Snead, 32, of Providence, and four other defendants have pleaded guilty to identity theft and credit card fraud for obtaining duplicate credit cards of victims’ accounts and using the cards at casinos, auto club service centers, and retail stores. Snead and his cohorts compromised the accounts of nearly 50 victims and defrauded three banks…