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A catastrophic mistake
by Asa Butcher
2007-11-21 09:49:45 |
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"Let us be clear about the scale of this catastrophic mistake - the names, the addresses and the dates of birth of every child in the country are sitting on two computer discs that are apparently lost in the post, and the bank account details and National Insurance numbers of 10 million parents, guardians and carers have gone missing,” was the response of Britain’s Shadow Chancellor George Osborne yesterday.
You read his words correctly because yesterday the Chancellor Alistair Darling announced to a stunned House of Commons that the details of 25 million children have been lost on two password-protected CDs. This criminally irresponsible behaviour has been blamed upon mistakes by junior officials at HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC), who ignored security procedures when they sent information to the National Audit Office (NAO) for auditing.
This is the second case in the last few weeks of the British Government admitting that sensitive personal information has been misplaced, but the fact that on this occasion the details of every British child is either lost or, in a worst case scenario, in the hands of an individual or organisation prepared to abuse this incredibly sensitive data has send a shiver of anxiety down every British parent’s spine.
I don’t blame the Chancellor or the Government and I was surprised to hear that HMRC chairman Paul Gray immediately resigned after the incident came to light, but how are the citizens of Britain supposed to relax knowing that every child has been exposed to a credible threat? Parents trust that personal information is secure and the Data Protection Act is regularly promoted, yet this situation has caught everybody off-guard.
At a time when the British Government is pushing their Identity card agenda, a scheme that will collect an immense amount of data in one location, how can anybody now have faith in the security? Even the word ‘security’ has become hollow, which is frightening considering we are supposedly under threat from all manners of individuals out to undermine democracy and inflict terror.
As a British citizen living in Finland, I have often wondered about the henkilötunnus (personal code) that is employed by the country. It is the Finnish version of the National Insurance number of Social Security code, yet it is used everywhere. Banks, the doctor, the social security office, employers, the tax office and more use this code and it has often made me consider if there is a single database that follows my every move and who has access?
If this database exists, can the details of every citizen of Finland be saved on one CD? It took two CDs to hold the details of 25 million children, so it won’t take many megabytes for a country of five million and what if that disc ever went missing… One result of this highlights the fact that it doesn’t matter how many security protocols you implement, if the staff don’t adhere to them there is no point at all.
I just hope the repercussions of this catastrophic fiasco won’t be severe and I hope it has merely been the result of sloppy delivery, but it does raise many difficult questions for the British Government. These questions will demand answers, clearly visible answers that will rebuild some of the public’s trust, or the hope of ID cards will be lost just like the two CDs.
UK Terrorism Security Children |
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