Disingenuous R Us?

http://winnipegsun.com/News/Winnipeg/2007/06/08/4245509.html

Computer containing medical results stolen

By Paul Turenne June 8, 2007

Health officials are in the process of contacting about 3,000 people whose CT scan, X-ray and ultrasound results were among the data contained on a computer that was stolen from Concordia Hospital last month.

Heidi Graham, a spokeswoman for the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority, said officials believe the computer was stolen for its hardware and not for the data. Graham also noted that the slides containing the diagnostic images of the 3,006 patients would likely not mean anything to a layperson anyway.

... She said police have informed the health authority that the possibility of the computer thief using the data for identity theft is remote.

Graham said hospital officials have since ensured all diagnostic image data on its computers is password-protected. [Since the theft? Bob]

The WRHA is in the process of contacting and apologizing to the affected patients, but nonetheless has set up a hotline where people with additional concerns can leave a message. [“Eleven months of the year, this hotline is for kids to leave messages to Santa...” Bob]

“The less we say the better we smell!”

http://www.press-citizen.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070608/NEWS01/70608007/1079

UI notifies graduate program students, faculty about security breach

By the Press-Citizen Friday, June 8, 2007 From University of Iowa News Services:

Students and faculty associated with a University of Iowa graduate program are being notified this week about a Web-site security breach. UI has sent letters to about 1,000 current students and applicants to the Molecular and Cellular Biology program and to 100 faculty members, said John Keller, UI Associate Provost and Dean of the Graduate College.

... "We are deeply concerned that this happened," Keller said. "We apologize, and we want our faculty, students and prospective students to know that we are working expeditiously to correct this problem. We have notified the appropriate UI and law enforcement officials, and we are evaluating our systems to identify additional ways to protect our Web sites.

... A staff member in the Molecular and Cellular Biology program identified the security breach on May 19. Social Security numbers of faculty, students and prospective students were stored on the Web database program that was compromised. [Someone hacked in? No details, but one must assume that if they can hack into one database, they can get into all of them. Bob]

Whatever Big Brother wants... Will this become an issue for debate in the US?

http://www.inthenews.co.uk/news/insurance/insurers-should-have-genetic-details-$1096772.htm

Insurers 'should have genetic details'

Friday, 08 Jun 2007 16:18

Insurers should be given access to people's genetic information, a medical ethics expert has said today.

Professor Soren Holm of the centre for ethics, law and society at Cardiff Law School believes that there is no good reason why genetic information should not be provided.

Writing in the British Medical Journal (BMJ), Professor Holm argues that if insurers are allowed access to personal information such as cholesterol level or body mass index then on principle genetic information should also be included.

"Genetic information is not special. It is not inherently more specific, predictive, sensitive, or private than other kinds of health information," he said.

Opponents of making genetic information available to insurers claim that it could deter people from having genetic tests done relating to their healthcare. But, Professor Holm claims, the same is true for other medical information such as HIV testing.

Follow-up Could you design a procedure that was fool-proof? (Remember, I can always find a better fool...)

http://www.out-law.com//default.aspx?page=8131

HBOS blames human error for data loss

OUT-LAW News, 08/06/2007

Bank of Scotland (HBOS) is telling 62,000 customers they could be at risk of identity theft after it stuck an unencrypted disc in the ordinary post, which was subsequently lost.

By John Oates for The Register.

The disc, containing information on mortage customers, should have been encrypted before being sent, the bank said, and should have been sent via secure courier rather than the normal postal service. It blamed human error for the problem, but said it believed the disc was genuinely lost rather than stolen.

... The spokeswoman said procedures had been changed and said a recent string of data breaches were unrelated.

I suspect this soon will be available everywhere. Can you sue a computer program for restating (summarizing and scoring) public information?

http://blog.seattlepi.nwsource.com/venture/archives/116417.asp#extended

Avvo's attorney rating system draws fire

Setting up an online rating system that attempts to rank the best and worst attorneys, is kind of like dipping your toes in shark-infested waters. Sooner or later, you are bound to get bitten.

That's the situation facing Avvo, the heavily funded Seattle startup that just four days ago unveiled a controversial Internet site that ranks lawyers on a scale of one ("extreme caution") to 10 ("superb").

John Henry Browne, a Seattle criminal defense attorney who in my story on Avvo Tuesday called the service a "joke," is now threatening to sue the company over what he calls a "ridiculously low rating" for him and other attorneys.

In a letter to Avvo dated June 7, Browne -- whose score on Avvo actually has risen over the past four days from 3.7 ("caution") to 5.5 ("average") -- asks that his profile be removed from the Web site.

"We have yet to determine whether it will be a class action lawsuit or not," he writes. "However, your rating and the attendant publicity has damaged my law practice and will continue to do so."

I reckon no one will need them, but this does come with subtitles...

http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/06/10/0424214&from=rss

Star Wars Takes Over Harvard Commencement

Posted by Zonk on Sunday June 10, @03:08AM from the my-brother-made-people-flap-like-a-chicken dept. Star Wars Prequels Education It's funny. Laugh.

An anonymous reader writes "Harvard University celebrated its 356th Commencement on Thursday. It is tradition at Harvard is to have an undergraduate deliver a Latin Salutatory address. This year's speaker, Charles Joseph McNamara, delivered an address all about Star Wars in Latin! TheForce.net has a write-up of the event, and the speaker was really hilarious. He apparently doesn't like Star Wars that much, but it's still awesome. The video is available online, and you too can see him do a Yoda voice and make light-saber motions ... in front of over 30,000 people. The speech is under "Morning Exercises" on the Harvard site. The Latin Oration begins at about 1:09:30."