British Government Loses Data On 25 Million Citizens
These discs, which could represent up to 40 percent of the British population, are not encrypted. Rather, they are merely password protected, meaning that if they fell into the wrong hands, the information on them could be fairly easily extracted. Lets just hope it isn't one of the passwords on this list.
The HMRC has no reason to believe that the information is in the hands of criminals. This catastrophic loss of data comes only two months after the HMRC lost information on 15,000 customers of the Standard Life insurance company. This has led the already normally combative parliament to get even more feisty with Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who opposition leaders say is trying to shirk responsibility in this issue. To his credit, though, Brown has ordered an investigation, and has granted his Information Commissioner new powers to spot-check agencies to ensure the security of data.
From BetaNews
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