UK's Families Put on Fraud Alert
December 1, 2007
From BBC News and International Herald Tribune: Two computer discs holding the personal details of all families in the UK with a child under 16 have gone missing.
The unencrypted disks, carrying bank account details and addresses for 7.5 million families claiming monthly child benefits, were lost after the tax agency’s headquarters dispatched them by mail courier to an audit office. A 10-day police search has so far failed to find the disks.
The Child Benefit data on them includes name, address, date of birth, National Insurance number and, where relevant, bank details of 25 million people. Chancellor Alistair Darling said there was no evidence the data had gone to criminals – but urged people to monitor bank accounts “for unusual activity”.
How is it the responsibility of British citizens to be vigilant for “unusual activity” after their government so grossly mismanaged their private information? A simple (and politically expedient) first step toward resolving this problem would be for the government to pick up the tab for monitoring these families’ credit records for the kind of activity that accompanies identity theft and fraud.
Aside from actually reforming the beaurocratic processes that led to this disaster, it’s the least the British government could do.
It’s of some comfort to hear that Privacy International will be taking legal action on behalf of the aggrieved, but it certainly doesn’t remedy the possibility of identity theft for 7.5 million families.
