Last month’s disappearance of a laptop from an employee’s locked car has determined Speare Memorial Hospital in Plymouth officials to send letters to 6000 of their patients, warning them of a potential threat against their private information.

The computer in question contained hospital account numbers, medical record numbers, names, addresses, and other patient and health information. However, no Social Security numbers or other sensitive information like insurance information or credit card information were stored on it. As the laptop and the employee’s desktop computer were synced, technicians were able to determine what exactly was lost.

Hospital spokeswoman Michele Hutchins said the hospital believes the information might not be on the laptop any longer.”Most likely this computer has been scrubbed, because the person who took it is was most interested in the hardware, but you can’t assume that,” she added.

As the information is encoded, it is very difficult to access or translate it, but 6000 patients have been notified an measures have been taken in order to improve security. The employee who had the laptop has resigned in the mean time.

“That management level administrator has since resigned because the confidential information was only designed to stay on the hospital’s secure server and not be saved on the hard drive of a portable computer,” said Michele Hutchins.

Two dentists from Phoenix, Arizona, Brian J. Daniels, D.D.S. and Paul R. Daniels, D.D.S. have recently posted a short notice on their website regarding a privacy breach. This breach involved a portable data device which was stolen on March 2nd and contained protected health information  for about 10,000 patients.

The notice, poor in any relevant detail, reads as follows:

HIPAA Breach Information for Patients of Record Certain electronically-stored patient records were stolen on March 2, 2011. If you have any questions please call 602-265-8751

As the website itself seems to be lacking content, and media coverage is quite poor at the moment, more information on this issue will become available when the Department of Health and Human Services publishes it.

The accidental loss of a computer hard drive is the source of a data breach that lead the MidState Medical Center to start sending letters of notice to the 93,500 potential victims. This has been brought to the attention of the employees on Tuesday. The incident urged the office of the Connecticut attorney general and the Department of Consumer protection to demand more details and to thoroughly investigate the matter.

According to Pamela Cretella, spokeswoman for the hospital, the lost data includes patient  names, addresses, birth dates, social security numbers and medical record numbers.

The loss of the hard drive by a Hartford Hospital employee has been brought to the hospital’s attention on February 15th. The hospital has immediately started to notify potential affected patients. Also an investigation has been started.

“The letter of notice has also been published on MMC’s website: MERIDEN – On February 15, 2011, we learned that a hard drive containing personal information of some patients of MidState Medical Center had been misplaced. The information contained on the device consisted of names, addresses, dates of birth, marital status, Social Security numbers and medical record numbers. Not all of the patients being notified of the incident had Social Security numbers on the missing hard drive.”

Cretella stated that no proof of any miss usage of the lost information has been found so far. However the hospital is offering free credit monitoring via Debix Identity Protection Network for 2 years.

Printed, stored on computers or on flash drives, your data is just not safe. Your personal details that you entrust to companies you work with, doctors and other third parties will just end up exposed. If you are lucky enough, they might get in the hands of someone who won’t use your address, social security number or card details to harm you on their quest to get fast and easy money. If you’re unlucky, your accounts will just turn empty one day, your identity will be used to commit felonies or crimes and you will have years of paperwork and bad credit records in front of you.

Let’s check the recent data breach news. We have a stolen computer that contained names, ages, addresses and medical conditions of 700 children. Next come rushing in: backup tapes and other media containing cord blood bank customer information stolen from car, which ended up exposing about 300,000 records; and 113 patients’ names and Medicare numbers on a document stolen from a vehicle…

Of course, not all private details are stolen! Some of them are merely lost! You can read all about a lost flash drive with 2777 names, medical record number and test results or another lost flash drive with 59 patients’ name, age, diagnosis, admission date and brief treatment notes as well as some ID card numbers on it!

Data breaches cost. First customers, then companies. You need to pay for your deed and there are fines, law suits and the big elephant in the room – loosing all your customers! Sounds like fun!

It actually does not. Data breaches are dead serious and you should try to prevent them. It’s always cheaper than dealing with the consequences. So take your time to find out about and then invest in an effective data loss protection and endpoint security solution. And try to do that soon!

Deloitte has recently admitted it had lost a laptop containing pension details on hundreds of thousands of individuals. What is different though is that finally this laptop contained encrypted information, was password-protected and no misuse of the stored information has been discovered. While losing laptops is not something to take lightly, I am happy to report those having it won’t be able to easily access the stored information.

So what did the laptop contain? According to the Register, 150,000 railway workers’ details, details on all UK Vodafone staff with pensions and as well as records of other unnamed pension funds were stored on the said laptop. No addresses or bank information though. How it was stolen? From a handbag of a Deloitte employee. Vodafone Staffers, as well as the railway workers have received letters letting them know what has happened soon after the theft. We’re now looking forward to see where the “thorough investigation” takes Deloitte.

Lost hardware is the cause of another data loss that has affected 5000 employees of the National Offender Management Service in England and Wales. The hard drive containing the personal records of the employees, including prison staff, was lost by a private firm, EDS.

Although detail on EDS and the circumstances in which the hard drive was lost are not yet very clear, the BBC article announcing the breach is rich in statements from Secretary of State Jack Straw and a couple of justice minister, as well as critiques of the British government.

Justice Minister David Hanson is the one who most surprised me. He stated he did not believe the safety of those working in the Justice system would be threatened. No wonder the British government and authorities are hit so hard by data losses or thefts if they have no idea what to consequences are. Of course their safety, identity and money will be threatened, a justice minister who’s at the second data breach in a few weeks, after loosing private info on thousands of criminals, should at least know that and not be taken by surprise .

Do you remember the Bank of New York Mellon’s lost backup tapes? Initially, it was said they contained private records on 4.2 million customers. Yet according to new info from DarkReading, the count has just rose to 12 million.

“When we announced [the lost tapes] back in May, we said we were going to do a top to bottom review across the company and go back and review it again,” a Bank of New York Mellon spokesperson said. “When we discovered [there was] this additional data that may have non-public personal data on it, we brought in a third party” to help investigate it, the spokesperson said.

The unencrypted tapes were lost by a courier earlier this year and according to data released in May, those whose private data was stored on them where clients of BNY Mellon Shareholder Services. The newly discovered clients that have been affected by the breach are currently being notified by the bank.