In the justice system: Ashley Johnson was arrested in Memphis for trying to open a store account under a false name. When police searched her vehicle, they discovered cards in dozens of other identity cards. Johnson allegedly used names and identification numbers she found on employee applications that she took from trash containers behind such…
Author: Dissent
New fraud reports attributed to Heartland Payment Systems breach
A few weeks ago, Clearstar Financial Credit Union reported that a few dozen of their members had detected fraudulent charges on their cards that began on March 25. Given that lists of possibly compromised card numbers from the Heartland Payment Systems breach had been sent out in January and thereafter, some of us wondered whether…
UK: Second data blunder fear
It’s amazing what you don’t find when you finally get around to looking for it. In this story out of the UK, a local council brought in consultants after one data breach, only to discover that their potential problem was bigger than they thought: …. Charnwood Borough Council admitted it could not find nine missing…
State privacy laws may undercut electronic medical records
John Timmer writes in Ars Technica: The US government has now adopted a policy of fostering the adoption of electronic medical records (EMR). The policy is intended to increase the efficiency of the US healthcare system, thereby lowering costs and reducing the incidence of preventable errors. At the same time, through its The Health Insurance…
HK: Lost flash drive with patient data wasn’t password-protected
Adele Wong of The Standard reports that the Hospital Authority has been urged to improve security to avoid further losses of patients’ records following another incident involving a lost flash drive with unencrypted data. In this most recent incident, a physician from the obstetrics and gynecology department at United Christian Hospital misplaced a USB flash…
Lessons not yet learned
For those readers who do not regularly read the companion breach site, DataBreaches.net, there have been five healthcare-related breaches reported in the past seven days. Two of the reports involved paper records and improper disposal. The other three incidents involved theft from business associates or third parties.  In all three of the theft cases, the…