http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/security/soa/Stolen-Google-s-employee-records-/0,130061744,339290305,00.htm
By Brendon Chase
ZDNet.com.au
03 July 2008
Google has confirmed that personal data of US employees hired prior to
2006 have been stolen in a recent burglary.
Records kept at Colt Express Outsourcing Services, an external company
Google and other companies use to handle human resources functions, were
stolen in a burglary on 26 May. An undisclosed number of employees'
details and those of dependents such as names, addresses, and social
security numbers were on the stolen computers. It is understood that
Colt did not employ encryption to protect the information.
It's still unclear how many more of Colt Express' clients were affected
by the breach. CNET Networks (publisher of ZDNet.com.au and Builder AU)
was another company affected by the burglary with around 6,500
employee's details stolen.
Although there is no evidence of misuse of the data to date, the
information obtained could be used by ID thieves to create fake accounts
and identities.
It's only come to light now that Google was one of the companies
affected. Google itself was not burglarised, nor was any of its internal
systems compromised.
[...]
Received on Fri Jul 4 04:18:58 2008