Privacy Breach on Bloomberg’s Data Terminals

[InfoSec News <alerts () infosecnews org>]

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/11/business/media/privacy-breach-on-bloombergs-data-terminals.html

By AMY CHOZICK and BEN PROTESS
The New York Times
May 10, 2013

A shudder went through Wall Street on Friday after the revelation that 
Bloomberg News reporters had extracted subscribers’ private information 
through the company’s ubiquitous data terminals to break news.

The company confirmed that reporters at Bloomberg News, the journalism 
arm of Bloomberg L.P., had for years used the company’s terminals to 
monitor when subscribers had logged onto the service and to find out 
what types of functions, like the news wire, corporate bond trades or an 
equities index, they had looked at. Bloomberg terminals, which cost an 
average of more than $20,000 a year, are found in nearly every banking 
and trading company.

Bloomberg said the functions that allowed journalists to monitor 
subscribers were a mistake and were promptly disabled after Goldman 
Sachs complained that a Bloomberg reporter had, while inquiring about a 
partner’s employment status, pointed out that the partner had not logged 
onto his Bloomberg terminal lately.

The incident led to broader concerns about the line at Bloomberg between 
its lucrative terminal business and the hypercompetitive newsroom, 
threatening to undermine the credibility of both. In a secretive world 
that thrives on opacity, traders and financial firms jealously guard 
every speck of information about their activity to avoid tipping their 
hand on their trades and investments.

“On Wall Street, anonymity is critically important. Secrecy and the 
ability to cover one’s tracks is paramount,” said Michael J. Driscoll, a 
former senior trader at Bear Stearns who now teaches at Adelphi 
University. He added: “If Bloomberg reporters crossed that line, that’s 
an issue.”

[...]

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