BreachExchange mailing list archives
Midlands Tech warns employees of security breach
From: Jake Kouns <jkouns () opensecurityfoundation org>
Date: Wed, 9 Mar 2011 01:48:36 -0500
http://www.thestate.com/2011/03/09/1728561/midlands-tech-warns-employees.html Midlands Technical College warned employees last month that a flash drive containing some of their personal information was taken from a human resources office at the college. The flash drive, since returned — without the personal data it previously held — could compromise the personal information of some of the college’s 500 employees. But Midlands Tech spokesman Todd Gavin said no problems have been reported by employees so far. “There’s no reason to believe that anybody’s information was compromised,” Gavin said. “The college is already working on an internal audit of its security to make sure this doesn’t happen again.” The security breach at Midlands Tech is the second acknowledged by an area college or university in the last week. The University of South Carolina warned employees earlier this month that a breach of computers at its Sumter campus exposed the personal information of 31,000 faculty, staff, retirees and students system-wide. USC officials, like those at Midlands Tech, said there is no evidence that anyone’s personal information was used improperly. Gavin said no student information was compromised in the Midlands Tech breach, which occurred at the college’s Airport campus. In an e-mail dated Feb. 18, Crystal Rookard, human resource director and legal counsel at Midlands Tech, told employees: “We take this situation very seriously and recognize our responsibility to maintain your confidence in our ability to protect confidential information.” A painter who was working near the human resources office where the flash drive was located has been questioned by law enforcement, Gavin said, adding he does not know if or when charges might be filed. “We don’t know how it got blank,” Gavin said of the flash drive. “We don’t think it was blank to begin with.” Rookard told employees, “The individual responsible for removing the flash drive has indicated that the flash drive was not accessed or viewed at any point.” In addition to the internal review of security procedures, Gavin said Midlands Tech is offering employees free credit monitoring. “To date, nobody’s reported anything out of the ordinary on their credit.” _______________________________________________ Dataloss-discuss Mailing List (dataloss-discuss () datalossdb org) Archived at http://seclists.org/dataloss/ Unsubscribe at http://datalossdb.org/mailing_list Learn encryption strategies that manage risk and shore up compliance. Download Article 1 of CREDANT Technologies' The Essentials Series: Endpoint Data Encryption That Actually Works http://credant.com/campaigns/realtime2/gap-LP1/
Current thread:
- Midlands Tech warns employees of security breach Jake Kouns (Mar 09)