In a news report headlined, “Data breaches earn UH an ‘F’,” Gordon Y.K. Pang reports: A national organization has given the University of Hawaii a grade of “F” for online security breaches that exposed Social Security numbers and other sensitive information in nearly 260,000 records. The Liberty Coalition, a nonprofit civil liberties watchdog group, yesterday…
Category: Commentaries and Analyses
Security flaws found in Nova Scotia government
Keith Doucette reports: Security weaknesses in computer systems operated by Service Nova Scotia and Municipal Relations place a wide range of personal and business information at risk, the auditor general concluded in a report released Wednesday. Jacques Lapointe said he found problems in the way passwords are controlled, computer accounts are set up and security…
Verizon breach disclosure web launched
Last week I posted a news item that Verizon was creating a web site where breaches could be reported anonymously. U.K. lawyer Stewart Room raises an interesting concern about using the site: This is a fascinating concept, but from a legal perspective it is potentially fraught with difficulty for those organisations whose employees decide to…
Why data breach costs are really going down
Rafael Ruffolo reports: A new study by Telus Corp. reveals that while Canadian organizations reported 29 per cent more data breaches in 2010 versus the previous year, the annual cost of these security issues has dropped substantially. The telecom giant’s report, which polled 500 business and IT professionals, was part of a joint study with…
Banks Rush to Fix Security Flaws in Wireless Apps
If you use a wireless app for banking, you’ll want to read this. Spencer E. Ante reports: A number of top financial companies and banks such as Wells Fargo & Co., Bank of America Corp. and USAA are rushing out updates to fix security flaws in wireless banking applications that could allow a computer criminal…
Pointer: Information Commissioner to issue fines – Finally!
Over on Cervello Consultants, Lindsay comments on an issue I raised earlier today blog post about fines for data breaches. Lindsay writes, in part: Do I think that the time has come for these floggings to take place in public? I’m afraid to say in my opinion it is. […] Fines and public humiliation are…