JOINT MEDIA RELEASE of the Office of the Privacy Commissioner and the National Health and Medical Research Council: The National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC), in cooperation with the Office of the Privacy Commissioner (OPC), today released new guidelines to assist health practitioners in making decisions about disclosing genetic information to their patient’s genetic…
Author: Dissent
OK judge extends block on controversial abortion law
The Associated Press reports that District Judge Daniel Owens has extended a temporary restraining order that blocks enforcement of a controversial abortion law, House Bill 1595. The law is being challenged on grounds that it violates the state constitution. Read more: http://www.kansas.com/news/state/story/1105028.html
UK: Shropshire Council found in breach of the Data Protection Act
The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has found Shropshire Council in breach of the Data Protection Act following the loss of an unencrypted memory stick containing sensitive information relating to a large number of adult social care clients and members of staff. The memory stick, which contained a social care management database including sensitive health information,…
So where are the breach reports on HHS?
The following is cross-posted from PHIprivacy.net: Under the provisions of the HITECH Act that went into effect several months ago, covered entities are required to report breaches involving the unsecured protected health information of 500 or more individuals to the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services. Unfortunately, HHS watered down the…
PA: Malware opens door to possible information exposure
From Pennsylvania State University’s web site: A computer in the Dickinson School of Law that contained 261 Social Security numbers from an archived class list was found to be infected with malware that enabled it to communicate with an unauthorized computer outside the network. As soon as the University became aware of the malicious software…
(update) RockYou admits security snafu exposed email login details
John Leyden reports: Social media application developer RockYou has vowed to improve its security and apply encryption following a breach that exposed 32 million user login credentials to hackers. Sensitive login credentials – stored in plain text – were left open to attack as a result of an SQL injection vulnerability in RockYou’s website. In…