Jo Macfarlane reports: The confidential medical records of patients treated at one of Britain’s top private hospitals have been illegally sold to undercover investigators. Hundreds of files containing intimate details of patients’ conditions, home addresses and dates of birth are being offered for as little as £4 each. The files were sold by two men…
Category: Of Note
PayChoice Suffers Another Data Breach
Brian Krebs reports: Payroll services provider PayChoice took its Web-based service offline for the second time in a month on Wednesday in response to yet another data breach caused by hackers. Moorestown, N.J. based PayChoice, provides direct payroll processing services and licenses its online employee payroll management product to at least 240 other payroll processing…
Knowing or reckless misuse of personal data – introducing custodial sentences
From the UK Ministry of Justice: Reference Number : CP22/09 Status: Open Open date: 15 October 2009 Close date: 07 January 2010 A consultation on exercising the power to provide for custodial sanctions for those found guilty of knowingly or recklessly obtaining, disclosing, selling or procuring the disclosure of personal data without the consent of…
Lawsuit: 29,000 say Kaiser hid security breach
Maria Dinzeo reports on a class action lawsuit stemming from a 2007 breach that was first reported earlier this year: Twenty-nine thousand Kaiser employees say the company did not inform them for more than a year about a security breach that left their personal information vulnerable to thieves. One employee says a woman stole her…
Card firm hacking hits thousands of Swedes
David Landes reports: Debit card information for tens of thousands of Swedish banking customers may have fallen into the wrong hands following a security breach at card manufacturers MasterCard and Visa. Computer systems at both card makers were breached recently, allowing hackers to get away with data on thousands of banking cards, the Aftonbladet newspaper…
Schwarzenegger vetoes Simitian’s privacy protection bill
Governor Schwarzenegger vetoed State Senator Joe Simitian’s (D-Palo Alto) Senate Bill 20. The bill would have strengthened and updated California’s landmark privacy protection law that requires businesses and state agencies to notify residents when sensitive personal information is lost or stolen from their databases. “I’m surprised as well as disappointed by the Governor’s veto,“ said…