From the BBC:

More than 600 staff at HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) have been disciplined for accessing personal or sensitive data, it has been revealed.

In a Commons written reply, Treasury Financial Secretary Jane Kennedy said that in many cases the penalty for staff was dismissal.

There were 238 people disciplined in 2005, 180 in 2006, and 192 in 2007.

Via Consuming Experience

The Financial Services Authority (FSA) is urging firms to change their attitude to data security and do more to help prevent their customers falling victim to identity fraud and other types of financial crime.

Link to press release

Via ZDNet Tom Espiner writes

The British Computing Society has criticised the government, claiming its high-profile data breaches have eroded public trust.

On Tuesday the BCS published the results of a survey of members of the public. Of the 1,025 respondents, 66 percent said their trust in government departments had decreased due to information breaches such as the loss of 25 million personal records by HM Revenue & Customs last year.

…”People inside the public sector know [it] is not terribly surprising that [breaches such as HMRC's] happened, but for people outside the public sector this was a huge shock.”

(via OUT-LAW.COM)

The Lords passed an amendment to the Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill, defeating the Government. It still needs to be approved by MPs in the House of Commons

The amendment would make it a criminal offence to “intentionally or recklessly disclose information contained in personal data to another person, repeatedly and negligently allow information to be contained in personal data to be disclosed, or intentionally or recklessly fail to comply with [their] duties”.

(Via ZDNet) Tom Espiner interviews The Earl of Erroll, member of the House of Lords Science and Technology Committee

… Data breaches are going to occur. Which is why I think that we need to not keep all our eggs in one basket. This is where I really do agree with the Information Commissioner that we need to limit the amount of data that is being kept by any one about us. Because if its not there it can not be taken or it can not be miss used, so why are we keeping a whole lot of stuff we don’t use. We always think that we can mine it later to catch the bad guys, actually I think more good guys get hurt than you ever catch bad guys in many of these cases. …

(Via ZDNet) Matt Loney writes

It will take another data scandal before tougher sentences are imposed for data misuse, according to the information commissioner.

“I called on the government some time ago to increase the penalty to a prison sentence. The government did listen and agreed to increase the penalty to a prison sentence in the Criminal Justice [and Immigration] Bill, but a last-minute, very intensive lobbying campaign… meant it got watered down. The result is that the prison sentence remains but will not be implemented straight away, which means we will need another scandal before it is implemented.”

(Via The Times) Jonathan Richards writes

Senior Whitehall figures are to be held personally responsible if their department loses or mishandles personal information, under a range of measures designed to increase data security.

Officials across the public sector, including permanent secretaries and chief executives of NHS trusts, are to be forced to take data protection “much more seriously” under proposals due to be laid out by Gus O’Donnell, the Cabinet Secretary.

In the coming weeks Mr O’Donnell is expected to present the findings of a report on data security. The report was commissioned by the Prime Minister in the wake of the loss of 25 million child benefit claimant records by the HMRC in November.

(Via The Sun) Anthony France writes

A ruthless rapist found victims by getting a job as a care worker and trawling a council’s database for vulnerable young girls.

Simeon Kellman, 43, used computer records to identify teenagers who had just come out of the foster care system. … Father-of-two Kellman began his vile campaign after landing a care worker job with Greenwich Council in South East London. Cops say he made a “substantial” number of computer searches on profiles of former foster children.