Entries from March 2008 ↓

Here we go again, another federal employee’s laptop stolen, this time including private health data of 2,500 patients.  Of course the kickers are; the National Institutes of Health sat on this information for a month and the data on the laptop *was not encrypted*, which is against their own regulations.  “Almost 2,500 patients taking part in a federal medical trial recently had their private health data compromised when a researcher’s laptop computer was stolen. The National Institutes of Health, which was responsible for safeguarding the data, made things worse by delaying in notifying the patients. This disturbing incident underscores the need for a strong federal law to protect medical privacy and for greater responsibility by those who handle sensitive medical information. In late February, a laptop belonging to a researcher at the N.I.H.’s National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute was stolen from the trunk of his car. It contained information about heart disease patients, including their names, dates of birth and diagnoses of their medical conditions. The data was not encrypted as it should have been, which made it possible for an outsider to read. The N.I.H. waited roughly a month before notifying the patients whose data was lost. The release of this information is serious. Heart patients probably do not want their employers or insurance companies, among others, to know the details of their conditions. The breach is also a setback for medical research. Patients are likely to be reluctant to participate in clinical trials if their privacy is not respected.“  Who’s checking on people with sensitive data?  Can people not see the weakest link in that chain?

EFF has a great writeup of a LAtimes article that covers why the fight against illegal wiretaps and surveillance is so important, and how it threatens our most basic right.

Going back to the ’20s, Sanchez reviews multiple occasions when authorities have used spying powers not to protect the country, but to further the political aims of parties and politicians:

The original FISA law was passed in 1978 after a thorough congressional investigation headed by Sen. Frank Church (D-Idaho) revealed that for decades, intelligence analysts — and the presidents they served — had spied on the letters and phone conversations of union chiefs, civil rights leaders, journalists, antiwar activists, lobbyists, members of Congress, Supreme Court justices — even Eleanor Roosevelt and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. The Church Committee reports painstakingly documented how the information obtained was often “collected and disseminated in order to serve the purely political interests of an intelligence agency or the administration, and to influence social policy and political action.”

Sanchez traces the history of US government surveillance abuses by both Democrats and Republicans throughout the 20th century. He emphasizes that surveillance isn’t just a threat to privacy — it’s a threat to free speech. That’s why today’s wiretapping debate matters, even to those who may think they have nothing to fear.”

This is the bottom line, and why I’m such a ardent supporter of EFF.  Feel free to join if you are so inclined, but either way, thanks for reading 

Nice to see that others are coming to the same conclusion, after considering all the facts, that telecoms don’t deserve any immunity (retroactive or otherwise) in regards to their illegal wiretapping activities.

Classified documents and testimony about the National Security Agency’s warrantless wiretapping program show that it’s not necessary to grant retroactive immunity to telephone companies accused of unlawfully opening their networks to government spies, key congressional Democrats said on Wednesday. In a five-page statement (PDF), U.S. House of Representatives Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers and 18 Democrats on that panel contended the Bush administration has “not established a valid and credible case justifying the extraordinary action of Congress enacting blanket retroactive immunity.” Skepticism about the Bush administration’s once-secret eavesdropping program is nothing new for the Democrats who signed onto the statement. The key difference here is that they say their latest conclusions are based on a series of classified reports and briefings to which many of them only recently had access. “Our review of classified documents has reinforced serious concerns about the potential illegality of the administration’s actions in authorizing and carrying out its warrantless surveillance program,” they wrote.

Now que Dubya squawking on about how we’re less safe because he can’t pardon AT&T and others from breaking the law and ignoring our constitutional rights. Big Business meet Big Brother.