rond36
11-30-2007, 06:50 PM
It's being called the worst data leak of the information age. Earlier this month, U.K. officials had to admit they'd lost hard drives containing personal information on almost half the country's population, including nearly all families with children. If that's not bad enough, the databases included the worst kind of information to lose -- consumer bank account numbers.
The price tag put on the loss is already $500 million. Prime Minister Gordon Brown had to issue a public apology, and the head of Britain's Revenue and Customs office was forced to resign.
The disks lost by British officials contained intimate details on every family in the United Kingdom that claims the child benefit -- a government subsidy payment that goes to every household with children. The disks were lost in transit. The information on them included the names, addresses, dates of birth, insurance numbers and banking details. In all, data on 25 million of Britain’s 60 million citizens were on the disks.
The stolen Veterans Administration laptop may sound comparable in number (26 million), but the type of data lost in that incident -- Social Security Numbers -- pales in comparison to the lost U.K. tapes.
To really understand the importance of the U.K. leak, it's important to understand how valuable raw bank account information is. In a report written soon after the U.K. incident, Litan said Social Security numbers sell for as little as $5 on the ID theft black market. But live bank account information can sell for as much as $400.
Whenever a large-scale theft of credit card numbers is revealed -- such as the theft of nearly 90 million account numbers from TJ Maxx -- card-issuing banks generally adopt a wait-and-see attitude. Sophisticated systems allow them to flag potentially stolen card numbers and watch carefully for signs of fraud.
There is simply no parallel system for bank account numbers, Litan said. So a similar incident in the United States might force banks to close and re-issue millions of checking accounts, at enormous expense.
Full article at MSNBC.com (http://redtape.msnbc.com/2007/11/britains-lost-d.html#posts)
Had to copy and paste some of the article because MSNBC news articles are there today and maybe gone tomorrow.
My condolences go out to any of our members in the UK that have children and may have a compromised bank account.
The price tag put on the loss is already $500 million. Prime Minister Gordon Brown had to issue a public apology, and the head of Britain's Revenue and Customs office was forced to resign.
The disks lost by British officials contained intimate details on every family in the United Kingdom that claims the child benefit -- a government subsidy payment that goes to every household with children. The disks were lost in transit. The information on them included the names, addresses, dates of birth, insurance numbers and banking details. In all, data on 25 million of Britain’s 60 million citizens were on the disks.
The stolen Veterans Administration laptop may sound comparable in number (26 million), but the type of data lost in that incident -- Social Security Numbers -- pales in comparison to the lost U.K. tapes.
To really understand the importance of the U.K. leak, it's important to understand how valuable raw bank account information is. In a report written soon after the U.K. incident, Litan said Social Security numbers sell for as little as $5 on the ID theft black market. But live bank account information can sell for as much as $400.
Whenever a large-scale theft of credit card numbers is revealed -- such as the theft of nearly 90 million account numbers from TJ Maxx -- card-issuing banks generally adopt a wait-and-see attitude. Sophisticated systems allow them to flag potentially stolen card numbers and watch carefully for signs of fraud.
There is simply no parallel system for bank account numbers, Litan said. So a similar incident in the United States might force banks to close and re-issue millions of checking accounts, at enormous expense.
Full article at MSNBC.com (http://redtape.msnbc.com/2007/11/britains-lost-d.html#posts)
Had to copy and paste some of the article because MSNBC news articles are there today and maybe gone tomorrow.
My condolences go out to any of our members in the UK that have children and may have a compromised bank account.