[ga] Bridging the Gap: Why privacy and security are so important XVIV - Loss of Unencrypted USB Drive Constitutes Violation of Data Protection Act, Says ICO

["Jeffrey A. Williams" <jwkckid1@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

All,

  Here we have an incident that demonstrates the relationship
fairly clearly of Security to Privacy and why such is so important.
Lets hope that the UK ICO's actions against this misguided 
health provider will be sufficient to incentivize other such services
to take their patients personal information more seriously and
exercise much more caution in the future.  I hope that the management
of this health care service provider is fined sevearly enough
to ensure that they understand that such lack luster an attitude
is never exceptable and will ensure that such a error in judgment
doesn't ever again occur.

See:
(June 4, 2010)
The UK Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) has found a Welsh medical
practice to be in violation of the Data Protection Act.  A staff member
at Lampeter Medical Practice downloaded unencrypted patient data to a
USB drive; the device was then sent to the Health Boards Business
Service Centre by post in March 2010, but the package never arrived.
Downloading unencrypted data onto a removable storage device violates
the practice's data security policy.  The head of the practice has
agreed to implement safeguards to ensure that a similar incident will
not happen again.  All mobile devices, including laptops, will be
encrypted and staff members will be re-educated about the data security
policy.  The breach affected 8,000 patients.
http://www.scmagazineuk.com/welsh-medical-practice-hit-by-ico-after-losing-unencrypted-memory-stick/article/171692/

Regards,

Jeffrey A. Williams
Spokesman for INEGroup LLA. - (Over 300+k members/stakeholders and growing, 
strong!)
"Obedience of the law is the greatest freedom" -
   Abraham Lincoln

"Credit should go with the performance of duty and not with what is very
often the accident of glory" - Theodore Roosevelt

"If the probability be called P; the injury, L; and the burden, B; liability
depends upon whether B is less than L multiplied by
P: i.e., whether B is less than PL."
United States v. Carroll Towing  (159 F.2d 169 [2d Cir. 1947]
===============================================================
Updated 1/26/04
CSO/DIR. Internet Network Eng. SR. Eng. Network data security IDNS. div. of
Information Network Eng.  INEG. INC.
ABA member in good standing member ID 01257402 E-Mail jwkckid1@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Phone: 214-244-4827