Kelly Fiveash reports from the U.K.: The Department for Education broke the Data Protection Act after it exposed the email addresses, unencrypted passwords and sensitive answers of members of the public who filled in an online form about parental controls on the net, The Register can reveal. However – despite the breach – the Information Commissioner’s Office…
Category: Non-U.S.
IE: Schools warned over IT risk as pupil accesses confidential files
Katherine Donnelly reports: Second-level schools have been told to step up their computer security after a pupil obtained a username and password that allowed access to confidential files. The problem has arisen over the use of generic usernames and passwords, which schools may make available to substitute teachers. The Department of Education alerted the Joint…
NZ: Ministry of Justice shuts down kiosks
In the aftermath of the WINZ breach, the NZ government has been reviewing all its systems. In the process, they discovered that the Ministry of Justice kiosks had a similar issue as the MSD Work and Income kiosks. The New Zealand Herald reports: The affected kiosks included three computers at the ministry’s national office, which…
Australia Post in online privacy breach (updated)
Natasha Bita reports: Another Australia Post computer glitch has exposed the names and locations of thousands of Australians who have been sent parcels. Australia Post was forced to shut down its electronic parcel tracking service yesterday, after an angry customer blew the whistle on the privacy and security breach. Customers who typed a random number…
Ca: Calgary Board of Education hit by new privacy breach as laptop containing 2,000 report cards stolen
Richard Cuthbertson reports that the Calgary Board of Education has had a second breach this month. I had missed the first one, I think. This latest one happened October 5th after an employee left a laptop containing the report cards of more than 2,000 students in a car. The laptop was stolen. Kindergarten to Grade 9…
UK: Greater Manchester Police force pays £120,000 penalty following data breach last year
From the Information Commissioner’s Office: An ICO investigation into a data breach at Greater Manchester Police has concluded with the force being fined for failing to take appropriate measures against the loss of personal data. The action was prompted by the theft of a memory stick containing sensitive personal data from an officer’s home. The…