[POSTANDCOURIER] Officials with the South Carolina Health Insurance Pool ...that's a state agency, right?
are investigating the theft of a laptop that contained Social Security numbers and names of people participating in the program, which provides insurance to people with pre-existing conditions. I use Linux exclusively, but I'm thinking seriously about making my next laptop a Mac. It's worth the extra dollars for the "Where is my Mac" service. I'd also advise using the BIOS (or whatever it's called now) password feature on any non-Mac laptop. Losing your phone is an irritation, and having your website hacked can be a real pain, but losing a laptop full of someone else's personal data can be tragic.
In a news release provided Sunday to the News Agency that Dare Not be Named, an attorney said the laptop was stolen in October from a car belonging to an employee of the program's independent auditor. The attorney says the insurance pool hasn't uncovered evidence the data has been accessed.
The files includes the subscriber identification number, which is the patient's Social Security number, along with the last name, first and middle initials, dates of service and provider identification numbers.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/31/2013 00:00 ||
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#1
...This is the second bad one we've had down here - earlier this year it was revealed that somebody hacked the South Carolina internal revenue database, and there's considerable evidence that that one was an inside job....
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
12/31/2013 5:19 Comments ||
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#2
Could someone tell me what is the image of American federal employees? Elite people as good or better as the best workers of the private sector? Avbout the same level than average private sectpor employeees? Below poroicvate sector but Above state employees? worse than state employees but better than Detroit employees? The lowest of the mowest, rejected by Detroit?
#3
You're going to get a spectrum of quality depending upon the agency or department in question. Otherwise its just about the same as any big business. Like any big bureaucracy, they generally have the same institutional culture. The political hacks at the top who push the agenda, the long serving senior executive service officers who are in a CYA mode as they can actually be fired, the middle grade supervisors who are out to protect their desk and if possible build an empire, and the rank and file who are generally motivated by longevity, that is, the youths actually 'believe' while the longer service ones are doing as little as possible and simply 'obeying orders' to avoid anything to jeopardize their pension investment. There's a whole population of government workers who gypsy from one department to another, particularly ones to where the money, expansion, and promotion opportunities arise. If you want honorable or dedicated 'civil servant' those would be found among the youth and up to early middle management types. The ones who are in occupations which involve actually putting their lives on the line are more respected than those who push paper.
#5
State of CT has lost my personal financial info 2x by leaving their work laptops in bars. The definition of public sector employee (the word worker is too pejorative) is the incompetent in law of the politically connected
Posted by: regular joe ||
12/31/2013 14:25 Comments ||
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#6
That also happens in private sector. It can even happen the laptop has an unecrypted disk.
I don't very care. No matter who your are, you've got NO goddam business taking your work computer into a bar, particularly if you're planning on drinking.
How many women leave their purses in bars, drunk or sober? I'm betting not many.
Posted by: Barbara ||
12/31/2013 20:20 Comments ||
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#8
But you see, Barbara, a woman's purse contains HER money, credit card, keys, and driver's license. A public employee nothing of value to him if he loses a state laptop.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
12/31/2013 21:05 Comments ||
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#9
My point exactly, Rambler.
Posted by: Barbara ||
12/31/2013 21:39 Comments ||
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#10
the subscriber identification number, which is the patient's Social Security number
I would almost swear that I've seen somewhere that it's illegal to use someone's SSN as any kind of account number.
#3
Y'all forgot about the buried pipeline that spewed 350,000 gallons of highly-toxic MBTF (?) gasoline additive into a Texas creek a few years ago? Or that little Caliphornia town blasted to smithereens three or four years ago?
BTW, I do think Keystone and others should be built. There is plenty for all, if the Gubbamint gets out of the way!
Posted by: Bobby ||
12/31/2013 15:42 Comments ||
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#4
Regarding Keystone, why doesn't Canada build some refineries and ship the pure stuff instead of the bulk crude? I'm sure if they put the word out Exxon or others might help finance them after all the stalls regarding keystone.
#5
If the US stalls long enough, Canada will just pipe/rail the oil to the coast and ship it to China.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
12/31/2013 16:23 Comments ||
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#6
It's not easy to build a refinery in a first-world country: they're dirty, expensive and hard to run well. Since the southern US refineries had the excess capacity it made sense to pipe the crude to them and let them do the work.
I'm comfortably certain that the Soros- and Hollywood-funded eco-fools would go after a Canadian refinery just as they have the Alberta tar sands, the Keystone pipeline and every other oil project. With that in mind it makes more sense just to sell the stuff to China and be done with it.
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/31/2013 16:30 Comments ||
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#7
The number of crude oil carloads hauled by U.S. railroads surged from 10,840 in 2009 to a projected 400,000 this year
Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway owns BNSF railway. Why build a pipeline when there is money to be made (and political contributions to be reaped)?
#9
OK, so there was another train that derailed that caused the oil cars to derail; that doesn't mean the oil train was dangerous; just in the wrong spot at the wrong time. Not to down play the incident, but how many times have airplanes run into each other on the ground? do we ban airplanes?
A bigger danger or perhaps a better question to ask is when are the older tank cars going to be retired? A few years back,, the safety standards for construction and testing were increased, however existing cars can remain in service. And with the big backlog railcar manufacturers have ( >2 years by some reports), the shippers have no incentive to replace the older cars. Note I said shippers; the railroads are rapidly getting out of the business of providing rolling stock, but rather only offering the rails and the locomotives/crew to transport the shippers' goods
[Libya Herald] The General National Congress has passed legislation regulating the legal profession, which has been generally welcomed by lawyers themselves. Since the law will be interpreted by... ummm... lawyers.
The bill, which was produced in consultation with legal firms gives lawyers protection when they are defending unpopular clients in "vexatious cases". It also sets out disciplinary procedures for those lawyers believed to have compromised the honour of the profession.
[An Nahar] Congolese security forces repelled a wave of coordinated attacks against symbols of power in the capital Kinshasa and other cities on Monday, leaving dozens of assailants dead in a day of fierce gunbattles.
Armed youths believed to be loyal to a pastor who challenged President Joseph Kabila in elections seven years ago stormed the state television ... and if you can't believe state television who can you believe?
station RTNC and took several news hounds hostage.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
12/31/2013 00:00 ||
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Mein Gott Obergruppenführer, they appear to be slaughtering themselves again. Colonel Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck was correct. These people are psychotic !
[DAWN] SHEIKHUPURA: A man was rubbed out upon his refusal to cast vote to the candidate in the upcoming local body elections on Sunday.
Naveed Aslam, a candidate for union council 77, got infuriated when Maqbool turned down his request to cast vote in his favour and shot him to death. Farooqabad Sadar police have started investigating.
Naveed Aslam, a candidate for union council 77, got infuriated when Maqbool turned down his request to cast vote in his favour and shot him to death.
Farooqabad Sadar police have started investigating.
In another incident, unidentified robbers shot a donkey cart owner dead on resistant near Mirza Virkan village on Sunday.
Reports said that Aziz Ahmad was going to his village when robbers intercepted him and tried to loot him. On offering resistance, the outlaws rubbed out Ahmad and fled.
Sheikhupura Sadar police are looking into the matter.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/31/2013 00:00 ||
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#1
Naveed Aslam, a candidate for union council 77, got infuriated when Maqbool turned down his request to cast vote in his favour and shot him to death.
Here, they just send the IRS, the EPA, OSHA and a few other Federal agencies after them.
[AFP] The UN General Assembly ordered a staff and the budget cut for the world body under pressure from the United States and other austerity-stricken industrialized powers.
After protracted negotiations, the 193 nation assembly on Friday agreed to cut 221 staff at the UN headquarters and ordered a one-year pay freeze for the more than 10,000 workers in New York.
UN members also voted to cut the UN's general budget to $5.5 billion for 2014-15, $50 million below the final spending level for the previous two years.
Continued on Page 49
[Egypt Independent] Thailand's powerful but politicized army sought to ease fears on Monday it might step in to resolve a festering political crisis, while anti-government protesters entrenched positions around Bangkok as they seek to disrupt a February election.
The latest round of an all-too-familiar political conflict in Thailand has dragged on for weeks. It flared last week into deadly festivities between police and protesters outside a stadium where registration for the 2 February poll was under way and at other rally sites around the Thai capital.
The head of the military added to the growing sense of unease on Thursday when he refused to rule out a coup after those festivities.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
12/31/2013 00:00 ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[POSTANDCOURIER] Officials with the South Carolina Health Insurance Pool 
[An Nahar] Congolese security forces repelled a wave of coordinated attacks against symbols of power in the capital Kinshasa and other cities on Monday, leaving dozens of assailants dead in a day of fierce gunbattles.
Mein Gott Obergruppenführer, they appear to be slaughtering themselves again. Colonel Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck was correct. These people are psychotic ! 
