Archive for July, 2011
July 29, 2011 at 2:06 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
By Evy Schwartz
Cash flow. It’s what causes small business owners to sit-up, drenched with sweat in the middle of the night because they’re worried about making ends meet. It can be a juggling act to keep the books balanced and enough cash flow to pay salaries and overhead. One misstep and it’s off to bankruptcy court.
Considering this, it is a fact that many small businesses are playing Russian roulette with their finances. How? By ignoring data security.
Everyday, small businesses Read the rest of this entry »
July 28, 2011 at 8:46 am · Filed under Compliance
By Evy Schwartz
It’s been a long day at work and you’re mentally drained. All you want to do is join your friends for a relaxing dinner out. Someone suggests Margarita’s. Definitely, it’s the perfect choice. After dinner, drinks and good conversation, you’re ready to start another day at work.
The next day, though, you get a call from your credit card company. They want to confirm that you’re charging $2,500 at an electronics store in a nearby city. What? Well, apparently your credit card has been compromised along with 200 other Margarita’s customers’ cards.
Of course your first thought is Read the rest of this entry »
July 26, 2011 at 9:57 am · Filed under Risk Management
By Evy Schwartz
Just when you thought there couldn’t possibly be another venue for hackers, here comes another threat. Security researcher, Charlie Miller, is claiming Apple batteries have a security flaw based on his recent research.
He’s not releasing detailed findings until he presents at the Black Hat Conference in Las Vegas at the end of this month but we do have general details. The problem with Apple batteries seem to be in their intelligence.
“Smart” batteries contain Read the rest of this entry »
July 22, 2011 at 1:53 pm · Filed under Secure Information Exchange
By Evy Schwartz
Remember the big Sony data breach that happened in April? To refresh your memory, hackers accessed the personal data of 100 million users of Sony’s online games. What really hurt Sony is they couldn’t verify whether 12.8 million credit card numbers were compromised or not.
One month later, Sony began talking about leaning on its insurers to help pay the staggering costs of the data breach. And we’re talking a deficit of $178 million in operating profit this year. This number includes strengthening their data security. However, potential compensation to the victims is not a part of this number.
So…back to the part about the insurers. Can you guess Read the rest of this entry »
July 21, 2011 at 1:06 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
By Evy Schwartz
On the lighter side for today:
Having trouble remembering things? Well, don’t worry because it may not be old age or the fact that you’re so stressed out that you’re forgetting things left and right. You can blame it on Google.
That’s right, I said Google. A new study from Columbia University suggests Read the rest of this entry »
July 20, 2011 at 4:09 pm · Filed under Secure Information Exchange
By Evy Schwartz
You had to know this was coming. There has been legislation introduced to protect American consumers from data theft. H.R. 2577, the Secure and Fortify Electronic (SAFE) Data Act has been introduced to the U.S. Congress by Representative Mary Bono Mack (CA-45).
This bill will require Read the rest of this entry »
July 19, 2011 at 1:41 pm · Filed under Secure Information Exchange
By Evy Schwartz
Health care companies beware. After years of neglecting to enforce HIPAA privacy rules on a regular basis, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is getting to work.
This month, HHS announced that the University of California at Los Angeles Health System has been fined a whopping $865,000. UCLA has also agreed to a long-term correction plan to settle the long list of violations. Doing so will just add to the total cost of the fine.
This fine may not be Read the rest of this entry »
July 18, 2011 at 10:35 am · Filed under Risk Management
By Evy Schwartz
Uh-oh…paternity and drug test information available for all to see! Yes, it’s happened again, another high-profile data breach. This time the breach happened to one of Australia’s largest DNA testing companies.
That type of data is highly personal and apparently, it was available via Google search results. There was a glitch in the software used to register requests for drug tests which left customer data searchable by Google.
IT expert, David Raffen, had a great thought. He says “My Read the rest of this entry »
