Danica Coto reports: An identity-theft ring that catered to illegal immigrants seeking to establish themselves in the U.S. stole the personal data of 7,000 public school children in Puerto Rico, officials said Tuesday. Members of the ring broke into about 50 schools across the U.S. island territory over the past two years to steal birth…
Category: U.S.
Bits ‘n Pieces
In the justice system: Lloyd Barkley pleaded no contest to charges he collaborated with Atin Singh and his wife in a plot to steal customer data from an unnamed Indian restaurant where Singh worked; the fake credit cards were then used at a local Safeway. More. Jorge Ignacio Lozano Apodaca and Angel Ernesto Zapien Del…
Met Life fax malfunction misdirects personal info
Metropolitan Life Insurance (Met Life) has notified (pdf) the Maryland Attorney General’s Office that for about two days in January, their electronic fax server malfunctioned after they had uploaded a software patch. As a result, personal information on some customers — including names, addresses, and Social Security numbers — was misdirected to other fax numbers….
Genica/Geeks.com still identifying new victims of 2007 hack
Genica/Geeks.com was in the news last month when they settled charges with the FTC concerning their database security. Less than two weeks later, they were notifying at least one state attorney general that they had identified yet more victims of the breach that occurred in 2007. By letter dated February 16, 2009 to Maryland, Genica’s…
CA: Octuplets hospital workers fired
Fifteen hospital workers have been fired for improperly accessing the medical records of octuplets mother Nadya Suleman, officials have said. Eight other staff at the [Kaiser Permanente Bellflower] hospital near Los Angeles were disciplined for looking at the records without permission, the hospital said. Read more on BBC See also L.A. Times
Romanian phisher gets 50 month prison term
Dan Goodin of The Register reports: A Romanian man has been sentenced to serve more than four years in US prison for taking part in a sophisticated phishing scam that cost financial institutions at least $150,000. Ovidiu-Ionut Nicola-Roman, 23, of Craiova, Romania, received 50 months in federal prison, followed by three years of supervised release….