Posted on 10/11/2007 11:45:42 AM PDT by Freeport
AN OHIO state IT worker will lose a week of vacation time over a lost backup tape, writes ComputerWorld.
The tape, containing Social Security numbers and other personal data on over 100,000 current and past state employees and taxpayers, was stolen last June from an intern's car.
Jerry Miller, an ERP project payroll team leader for the Ohio Administrative Knowledge System (OAKS), was held responsible for not ensuring the security of the data on the tape. His penalty, suggested by a state Office of Collective Bargaining worker, will be the loss of one week of future vacation time.
Reportedly the state of Ohio spent $3 million investigating the security breach. A spokesman for the Ohio Department of Administrative Services said the state would be sure to be more careful with its data next time. µ
Why wasn’t he fired? It seems like losing a backup tape would be, at the very least, malfeasance.
When are people going to have to accept consequences — real consequences — for their misbehavior, ineptness, or just plain old malfeasance?
These types of tapes should never ever leave a controlled area. If they have to be transported it should be done securely. Leaving a tape in your car is stupid beyond belief. Not only is it easy to lose but also very easy to damage the tape.
Just post his SS number and name on a billboard. Seems fair?
“Why wasn’t he fired? It seems like losing a backup tape would be, at the very least, malfeasance.”
He’s a gov’t employee. I’m surprised he lost vacation time. He probably won’t even notice it’s missing.
Yah, it sounds satisfying to just fire ‘em. But firing everybody that makes a mistake leaves one with no employees pretty soon. Certainly not any employees with any experience.
Sometimes the people who have made a mistake before are the least likely to make that mistake again.
Wow...I know here at work if vital info on backup went missing, the person who was responsible would be summarily dismissed.
That can't be done as a blanket policy but it really depends on the seriousness of the mistake. Violating security procedures and having that action result in a compromise of sensitive data ranks right up there.
Because government employees can't get fired, no matter how badly they screw up:
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=38879
Fire some government employees
June 10, 2004
There is simply no accountability for government employees. Once they have a job, it's practically a job for life. Almost no one ever gets fired from a federal government job. The statistics are staggering.
According to the Office of Personnel Management, only one in 5,000 non-defense workers get fired annually for poor performance.
From 1984 through 2001 - a period of 17 years - of 28,000 employees in the State Department, only six were fired for poor performance. Yet, I think we could safely eliminate the entire department and not lose a step as a nation.
Only one person was fired from the entire Education Department in 2001. Only two were fired in the entire Transportation Department that year. Only two were fired from the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
In all the federal bureaucracies combined in 2001, only 434 employees were fired - and that was higher than the annual average. That 434 figure represents a negligible 0.02 percent of all federal government employees.
They should take their lesson with them to their new job after serving a sentence. That would give them more time to reflect on what they did.
They should take their lesson with them to their new job after serving a sentence. That would give them more time to reflect on what they did.
Surely, the data was encrypted. Even I encrypted my data.
By that standard, we should all be in prison.
EXACTLY!!!
That's true. I'm not saying I wouldn't fire the guy in this case. But it seems like the standard response on just about any thread where somebody screws up is just a knee-jerk reaction to roll heads.
It matters whether it was inadvertant or negligent or a whole host of other things. As it would happen I ~have~ fired somebody for a situation involving backups and tapes. Not this fact set, but in the same direction.
More to the point: If the policies and procedures in place at that IT shop were such that it was easy and unnoticed for somebody to just walk off with a tape... then it sounds to me like the problem isn’t so much that one guy, but up the chain of command, starting with how people are trained and how effective their policies are.
Or: Was the tape never lost at all, and instead sold?
Because he was a Gubmint employee.
Well, I’ve been doing IT work for 20 years or so. I have about seen it all. Sometimes a firm won’t spend the necessary money to assure their data is safe. Sometimes it is incompetence. Sometimes it is piss poor procedures. Sometimes it is piss poor management.
By the time they look for someone to blame, there is no telling what the real story is.
I can relate actual incidents if anyone is interested.
I don’t understand why any employee has sensitive information on their laptop, backup tape or anything else in their personal possession.
Seems to me that anyone working with that kind of info should have to connect to an external hard drive that stays at the facility.
Must be related to the Sandy Burglar.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.