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Nuclear Agency Worker Information Hacked
Juha-Matti Laurio writes to mention a Reuters report about a fairly worrying case of identity theft. A determined hacker gained access to the U.S. National Nuclear Safety Administration's records and made off with the information for over 1,500 employees and contractors. From the article: "The incident happened last September but top Energy Department officials were not told about it until this week, prompting the chairman of the House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee to demand the resignation of the head of the NNSA. An NNSA spokesman was not available for comment."
Uhhhh.... maybe because these contractors are handling classified information such as the location of various and sundry nuclear waepons and other realtively sensitive information??????
When a few numbers can be used to perpetrate ID fraud, we have a problem. This problem was made possible by the use of the Social Security Number as a "federal serial number." The abuse of the SSN for anything BUT Social Security accounting purposes needs not only to be "discouraged" as it presently is, it needs to be made ILLEGAL.
If you want credit, go apply to the credit agencies the way they once did and use other companies as a reference the way things used to be in the good ole days. What does getting credit or a bank account have to do with your social security account anyway? Why does supplying my social security number become a requisite for getting a bank account? In some states, your SSN is also your driver's license number.
It's "convenient" for the government and all agencies and companies interested in collecting massive pools of information on single individuals. That's kinda the problem. That's been the argument for decades since the inception of the SSN.
We'll always be vulnerable as individuals because we cannot do anything about anyone else having our information... we don't even know who has it. We're ultimately powerless until we can have the use of the SSN for anything but Social Security accounting made illegal.
When dealing with nuclear security (not nucular like bush says) i expect them to have all kinds of background on contractors. When safety is an issue you need to know this stuff. You are right though that sometimes the government is overzelous but in this case i think its warranted.
unzip; strip; touch; finger; mount; fsck; more; yes; unmount; sleep
The incident happened last September but top Energy Department officials were not told about it until this week, prompting the chairman of the House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee to demand the resignation of the head of the NNSA.
It's different than telling the public.
That which does not kill me only postpones the inevitable.
Ask not why some poor little schmuck lost his job for hiring idiots and building a culture of cover-up and deceit in his organization. Ask why some other bigger schmuck did not.
What I don't understand is why we don't hold people accountable more often. It clearly is a tradition that has fallen on hard times in the U.S. In Europe it seems to be more common for government heads to be "held accountable" for the organization they run.
If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine.
The Department of Homeland Security is busy spying on every American's phonecalls and email. The Republican government is furiously working to fail to pass Homophobia Amendments to the Constitution. Meanwhile, our nuclear workers can now be blackmailed on an unprecedented scale.
Do you feel safer?
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make install -not war