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100 Million Victims of Data Theft
jcatcw writes "With the latest significant data breach — theft of a Boeing laptop with unencrypted personal information on 382,000 employees — the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse estimates that the total number of data breach victims has passed 100 million since they started tracking in February 2005. The director, Beth Givens, admits 'the number 100 million is largely a fictional number,' but it surely errs on the low side. Since California is still the only state with disclosure laws, incidents are difficult to analyze fully. However, Congress this week passed a bill requiring that the Department of Veterans Affairs report breaches."
How can you trust the article when they make the outlandish claim that Boeing makes laptops. They make airplanes, silly.
Right now, it's becoming clear to me that the problem is that the weak chain in the link is that the creditors/banks/etcetera consistently rely on a few lines of data to complete transactions and identify the parties involved, 95% of which is publicly available, the other 5% easily stolen.
I don't know what to do to solve this, any suggestions?
(Way back when, my friend who worked at a Sam Goody used to actually check credit cards when customers bought something on his first day on the job. After the manager caught wind that he denied someone using their friend's mom's credit card, supposedly with permission, he got yelled at and told not to do it again. I can't help but think that the laws are too lax in this area and the industry has little interest fixing it.)
I wish I was the copyright holder, and protected by the applicable laws, of my own personal information.
Ronald said nothing. He flung himself from the room, flung himself upon his horse, and rode madly off in all directions.
http://dilemma.gulecha.org - My philospohical short film.
Yeah, there's that problem; and also the fact that it is 100M known victims of identity theft.
From the article: "A stolen laptop at The Boeing Co. has pushed a widely watched tally of U.S. data breach victims past the 100 million mark". Saying that the 100M people are thought to have had data disclosed about them is not the same as saying that 100M people are known victims of identity theft.
Not all conservatives are stupid,
but it is true that most stupid people are conservative.
- Hume
I have been counted at least twice though. I am a veteran and got a letter from the VA with a previous theft, and that was just a few months after I got a letter from Boeing telling me that my info was stolen. Have not heard anything about this latest one, I do appreciate the free credit monitoring I get now, but I am not convinced it would do me any good if someone was really using my info. Plus it is only for one year, that is a relatively short period of time, the info has an unlimited life.
People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf.
the strangely named "Privacy Rights Clearinghouse" has just announced that they'll be showing up at one lucky person's house with a giant check with all 100 million pieces of personal data written on it in a really, really small font. I hope I win it!
Google's Super Secret Search Algorithm: SELECT @search_results FROM internet WHERE @search_results = 'good'
I never read of anyone having suffered consequences as a result of someone losing their data. Why is that?
Doesn't it seem as if there would be a few major class action lawsuits, at the very least? You'd think every time data loss occurs on this large a scale, it would be followed by droves of people suffering from identity theft or fraud
- Access to my credit report/score
- Big 3 credit bureau monitoring - notification of any new accounts or loans in my name
- Personal case officer (through the bank) if something happens
These services can be purchased for anywhere from $5 to $12 a month depending on the bank. I suppose I could still get burned but I can't imagine any of it could hurt, well worth the money at any rate in my mind.while [ 1 ]; do echo -n -e "\xe2\x95\xb$((($RANDOM&1)+1))"; done
First off, the term "identity theft" is completely ridiculous. No one is taking away who you are. Your friends and family won't suddenly forget who you are. A better term would be "credit fraud".
This is the basic scenario: A criminal poses as you to borrow money (usually with a credit card), and then whoever lent that person the money asks you to repay it.
Then there are generally 2 consequences for you: debt and reputation damage. The debt itself is usually the lesser of the two problems, since you're not legally obligated to repay money that someone else borrowed in your name. Reputation damage, on the other hand, is incredibly hard to repair. This usually takes the form of erroneous information on your credit report.
Private agencies (Equifax, Experian and TransUnion are the majors in the USA) maintain this information of your past financial transactions, and sell it to potential lenders in the form of a credit report. Lenders then use this information to decide how risky it would be to lend you money. These credit reporting agencies err on the side of over-reporting negative information, because a defaulted loan from an under-qualified borrower costs banks and lenders much more than a qualified applicant being turned away. Additional services (like providing reportees an easy way to correct errors) would cost credit reporting agencies much more than their client lenders would be willing to pay for the increased accuracy, so they don't bother implementing them.
The short version is that banks and other lenders knowingly rely on imperfect information about potential borrowers, because it is the most economically sensible thing to do. It's not profitable for them to pay for more accurate information. If they decide not to lend you money, even based on erroneous information, it will likely be very hard to change their minds.
"In a 32-bit world, you're a 2-bit user. You've got your own newsgroup, alt.total.loser." -Weird Al
I think perhaps some restraint is justified on the part of Journalist's. Reporting the possible discloser of 382,000 peoples private information is one thing. Telling the world that there is a laptop floating around somewhere in Chicago with that information on it is another.
Not all conservatives are stupid,
but it is true that most stupid people are conservative.
- Hume
The university I graduated from reported someone had hacked in and gotten access to about 6K student and faculty records, including payroll info.
Their idea of taking care of the problem? Wanting me to register online (!!) or over the phone to be told if I was one of the victims, and also to get a free credit report or get credit monitoring, though they don't seem to think they should pay for that or for any fees I might get if I have been victimized...
Oh, and I only found out because it was in the local news.
On Europe we have a common Directive (that means its the same for all countries and it sets common guidelines that must be made into law by each nation) that establishes some measures that must be taken to protect all the personal information. On my country, companies are not allowed to store customer's personal information on a laptop, for example.
Please google and research "peak oil" a bit. You will discover this crisis is a lot worse than they have told you
It was probably some schmuck trying to make an unreasonable deadline for some reports, trying to put in a few extra hours of work at home so he doesn't get yelled at by his PHB, who didn't give said schmuck the approval needed to get a secure remote connect because it would have cost his department a few extra dollars.
You can enforce encryption on every file, strong passwords etc but sooner or later some smuck will print it out and forget to schred the printout when done. So it ends up on some dump available to anyone crawling around looking for something usable.
Designers of company security forget the most obvious and most dangerous threat: stupidity! My personal favorite quote used to illustrate exactly that is the following:
When the infamous "ILOVEYOU" email virus hit, I saw TV news coverage that included an interview with some bubblebrained company secretary. At one point she said, "Oh, I saw we had dozens of these emails coming in, and of course I was suspicious, but I had to open just one of them because, you know, 'I Love You!' *giggle* I had to just see what it was about, you know?" You can't foolproof a system, you simply need to get rid of the idiots. Which sadly is easier said than done...I realize this is probably a troll, but I'm responding in case it isn't.
/b/ scene. Get out of town for a while if you can.
It isn't too late. But you have a tough choice to make. You can either choose to make your life better, or choose to let life push you around. Changing is not easy.
Read Sartre, Camus, Nietzsche.
Pull your ethernet cable, unplug your wireless router. Take some time off of the
Think about your goals -- both the failed and incomplete. Ask yourself why the failed ones failed. Resolve to fix the problems that caused them to fail. Evaluate your incomplete goals. Make plans to finish them. Commit to your plans.
Exercise is good for you. I don't mean to make fun of your belly. But you obviously need to become stronger to become the man you want to be.
Don't sweat being bald.
You've wasted a lot of time, but you're still young. There's no point wasting any more.
After all, I am strangely colored.
Two words: Terminal Server.
I know it has been asked before, but WHY in the name of GOD does this kind of information need to be on a fucking laptop?!
My mother works at a VA hospitol and as such, has access to read and modify all the personal information necessary to commit identity theft on thousands of patients, and of course, she has a laptop computer issued by the hospitol so that she can work from afar. When she originally received it, it was nothing more than a Win2k box with VPN software, MS terminal services. All of the sensitive data was/is stored on the servers on their intranet. After a small "upgrade," the laptop was returned, only this time it came back with a full encryption setup. The interesting thing is that there is STILL no sensitive data stored on the laptop. It is, however, just as easily accessible. The point is, if someone stole that laptop, no sensitive data would be compromised, even if the encryption was broken (which probably wouldn't happen).
I don't fucking understand, why when we have the technology READILY available to completely prevent this kind of crap, that it isn't used. A shout out to all the companies on this planet: Centralize your damned security. Laptops cost $500. This kind of shit publicity and potential lawsuits cost a hell of a lot more.
Boot Windows, Linux, and ESX over the network for free.
Do you really think they'll take off?
Oh and in case anyone is interested in reading the full response from Jim McNerney (Boeing's CEO), here it is.
The people who send you preapproved offers have very little info on you, pretty much just name and address. Basically they ask one of the credit reporting agencies for a list of people falling within a given set of criteria. They then send offers to those people. IF you want to take them up you have to give them more info and they get a full rundown of your credit and decide if they still want to give you credit, and if so on what terms (you can be turned down for preapproved cards).
You can opt out of this if you want, you have to contact the credit bureaus and tell them to quit giving out your info for this and they will.
THE PROBLEM: It is currently financially worthwhile for some companies to play loose with personal information. The perceived costs of the consequences of poor protection are not sufficient to warrant a change in their way of doing business.
Many merchants / agencies / whatever don't seem to want to provide us additional protections. All it would take is for a few companies who already take security very seriously to sign up for the best star rating listed below, chalk it up to advertising expense, and put the pressure on the other merchants who do not sign up. "Hey! *WE* take your security seriously, and we put our money where our mouth is. If *WE* mess up, we clean it up and pay *YOU* for your inconvenience. Why would you want to deal with anyone else?"
There is a financial opportunity for an enterprising group to make a fortune here. Existing insurance companies provided graduated coverages and fees depending on certain items. I can select how much liability insurance I want for my car. I can pay the insurance company a larger premium for a greater amount of coverage. Alternatively, if I have certain protective measures in place, then my premiums can be reduced. I choose the level of coverage that works for me.
whenever there is a security breach, make a payment to each CONSUMER! Get the consumer to be your best ally in getting merchants to sign up for the protection. So, if a merchant compromises the security of MY information, then the insurance company sends ME a check. I'll leave it as an exercise for the reader on how this could be extended to cover other organizations that have access to personal info such as hospitals or government agencies.)
Also, and VERY important: advertise this feature like crazy - get the consumers to push the merchants to get the coverage along with an easy-to-remember grading scale for consumers to use to assess the degree of protection they are provided by a merchant. It took a few years, but now US car companies are advertising the NHTSA crash test ratings. I expect the same could work for credit protection.
NOTE: All dollar amounts are pulled out of a hat. I'm just trying to put something concrete out there to use as a starting point for discussion. Obviously, the size of the covered merchant would affect the premiums and payouts, and I have NOT worked those into these numbers. Please offer improvements! The examples listed here might be appropriate for a moderate to large merchant.
Have a graduated scale of costs and coverages that depended on what level of security measures were in place at the time of the loss / theft.
If a merchant takes no security precautions then the insurance company would:
The consumer gets some benefits, even if the merchant makes no great effort to protect the user. It's still better than anything that the consumer is now getting. After a few payouts, word-of-mouth will boost interest by consumers in seeking out at lest this minimal coverage. CEOs and CIOs will start to take notice.
If a merchant takes certain, documented, security precautions ( encrypted DBMSs, firewalls) then the insurance company would:
Yes, they follow the law. Otherwise they face fines (companies) and jail (people responsible for personal data security or lack of it).
I have worked in one of European national telecoms, I had access to full personal data of millions of our clients. Our computers were locked down so we couldn't copy the data on floppy/cd/usb. The network was tightly separated from the rest of the company intranet not to mention the Internet. Our office was monitored.
Before even touching the keyboard for the first time we had two full days of lectures about the relevant personal data protection bill, internal company rules, how to behave in case of security breach and so on.
Yes, personal data security is taken very seriously here. It always amazes me why with you don't have similar set of laws in the US.