Puget Sound Energy, Washington state’s largest electricity and natural gas utility, with over 1 million customers in 11 western Washington counties, was ordered to pay a total of $995,000 in fines for selling their customer information to marketing companies over a five year period. Only 18,992 of the transferred calls during the five years of the marketing program–from November 2001 to March 2006–were subject to penalties because of a two-year statute of limitations, according to the commission statement.
Archive for the ‘Privacy and Compliance’ Category
Puget Sound Energy Ordered to Pay $995,000 For Selling Customer Personal Information
Tuesday, January 30th, 2007Routine Personal Information Posting in the U.S. State Government Agencies
Monday, January 29th, 2007NBC news ran a story about how many state government agencies post sensitive personally identifiable information (PII) on their websites. In this case an Ohio county court “routinely posted traffic tickets and other public records on its Web site.”
Privacy Incident: Ohio Board of Nursing Exposes Personal Information of 3,031 Individuals
Thursday, January 25th, 2007The Columbus Dispatch reported today, “OHIO BOARD OF NURSING Error puts nurses‚Äô personal data online.”
Reportedly over the past two months the “names and Social Security numbers of 3,031 newly licensed nurses were posted online twice.”
Court Ruling: ISPs in New Jersey Must Keep Personal Information Private
Tuesday, January 23rd, 2007An article from yesterday caught my eye, “Court finds NJ users can expect privacy from Internet providers”
A few excerpts:
Privacy Pitfalls
Monday, January 22nd, 2007I had the opportunity to be the guest editor for the October Cutter IT Journal for an issue I called “Avoiding Privacy Pitfalls;” Cutter recently published notice of it.
It was great to put this together through the fantastic and greatly insightful as well as useful contributions of Dr. Andrew Jones, D.J. Vogel, Mark Fischer, David Lineman, Khaled El Emam, Roger CLarke and Timothy Virtue. They discussed privacy issues that organizations often overlook, ignore, or are completely oblivious about. For example, Dr. Andrew Jones describes his very interesting research into all the personally identifiable infromation (PII) on discarded equipment, and Roger Clarke discusses how to use privacy as a strategic factor within an organization.
Info Sec and Privacy Pros Need Ongoing Training
Saturday, January 20th, 2007I write a lot about the need for a comprehensive and ongoing information security and privacy education program within organizations. Many people do. More is needed. However, something that I don’t see written about much is the need for information security and privacy practitioners and leaders to also receive ongoing training covering the issues for which they are responsible. We see a lot of seminars and conferences offered, but it is often hard to get the budget approved to attend these, let alone be able to take 2, 3, 4 or even 5 days away from the office.
U.S. Commerce Dept’s CISO Leaves for the GAO Asst. Director of Security Position
Wednesday, January 17th, 2007There was an interesting short article from the Government Computer News today, “CISO leaving Commerce for GAO.”
PIPEDA Action: Canadian Airline Refuses to Make Changes After Customer Complains
Monday, January 15th, 2007The Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada published findings last week for a PIPEDA case in which an individual complained that a Canadian airline refused to give him access to his personal information.
It is interesting that the names of organizations are not published within the decisions and summaries of the Privacy Commissioners.
Laptop Incident: N.C. Dept of Revenue Laptop Theft Puts 30,000 Residents At Risk
Saturday, January 13th, 2007Today the North Carolina Charlotte Observer reported a laptop was stolen from the car of an N.C. Department of Revenue employee in December.
They mailed letters to all 30,000 individuals this week. According to the report this is the first time notifications have been made within N.C. since they put their privacy breach notification law for government agencies into effect during the fall of 2006.
