NC: Charlotte loses data on 5,220 city workers

[kirniki <kirniki () gmail com>]

http://charlotte.bizjournals.com/charlotte/stories/2010/05/24/daily27.html

The city of Charlotte says the personal information of 5,220 current
and former city employees and elected officials has been lost.

The loss affects individuals who received health insurance from the
city in early 2002.

According to a city news release, two DVDs containing the Social
Security numbers of the affected individuals failed to arrive at the
offices of Towers Watson & Co., the city’s benefits consulting firm,
in Atlanta. The discs also contained prescription-drug information for
five individuals.

The city blames a mail-service provider working with Towers Watson.
The city says it was notified of the lapse on Feb. 23.

The files on the DVDs were not encrypted. That failed to comply with
Towers Watson’s policies to prevent anyone who finds the discs from
accessing the information, the city says. Because the lost information
might be subject to protection under state and federal laws, the city
has notified all affected individuals, the N.C. attorney general’s
office and the secretary of Health and Human Services.
[..]
_______________________________________________
Dataloss-discuss Mailing List (dataloss-discuss () datalossdb org)
Archived at http://seclists.org/dataloss/

Get business, compliance, IT and security staff on the same page with
CREDANT Technologies: The Shortcut Guide to Understanding Data Protection
from Four Critical Perspectives. The eBook begins with considerations
important to executives and business leaders.
http://www.credant.com/campaigns/ebook-chpt-one-web.php