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Another day, another data breach. Government agencies leak information like a sieve. And they reason they do it is SHEER, UTTER INCOMPETENCE.
Of course, the Calvert Street Communist Party Newsletter chalks it up to data not being "encrypted" on a notebook.
But the problem is much, much worse. And the government is not the only stupid organization that takes improper measures with your data and mine.
Here's a basic rule that every company, organization, club, group of four, etc. should follow with confidential information:
NEVER PUT CONFIDENTIAL DATA ON A FRAKKING PORTABLE DEVICE!
If it can walk, it will walk. It is can be encrypted, it can be decrypted. Physical security of the storage medium is as important as the logical security of the data stored on the medium. Notebooks, PDAs, SmartPhones, and portable hard drives get lost, stolen, dropped etc. every day of the week. Morons leave them in their cars on the front seat (true story: happened to the Direct of Applications Development at eSylvan). Vendors put them on equipment carts in busy hallways in hospitals (see, McKesson, they are so stupid). And your average dumbass business traveller with leave them in a bad at their feet sitting in line at the cattle call at Southwest Airlines.
If Americans truly understood the extent to which their personal information was out and available, there would be a civil war in this country. If they understood how careless the government and government contractors (not to mention healthcare IT contractors) were with their data, no government official would be safe from the tar and feather.
If you want data security, you need to provide PHYSICAL and LOGICAL security of the data. Or, as I put it before:
NEVER PUT CONFIDENTIAL DATA ON A FRAKKING PORTABLE DEVICE!