WRITTEN ON August 4th, 2009 BY William Heath AND STORED IN Data nitwittery, Foundation of Trust, We told you so..., What do we want?

Nine local council staff have been sacked for illegal access to the ID database, says Computer Weekly.

* Cardiff and Glasgow councils sacked staff after they looked up celebrities’ personal records
* Tonbridge and Bromley councils sacked workers for looking up their friends
* Brent sacked someone who looked at their girlfriend’s details
* A worker at Torfaen was sacked for looking at his own details

But this may just be the tip of the iceberg. Many of the breaches were discovered after sample checks, raising concerns that other breaches may gone undetected. Over 200,000 government officials have access to the database, including staff at 480 local authorities, and numerous government departments, including the Department of Work and Pensions, HM Revenue & Customs, and the Courts Service. The Child Support Agency uses the CIS to trace missing parents…

Happily a DWP spokesman was quickly on the scene

“The small number of incidents shows that the CIS security system is working and is protected by several different audit and monitoring controls, which actively manage and report attempts at unauthorised or inappropriate access.”

But….but….but… the staff all seemed so plausible and nice when we interviewed them for their jobs. They all passed the most stringent tests and checks.

Ah well. No doubt there has been a thorough review to ensure that the blindingly inevitable doesn’t ever happen again.

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