Massive Information Theft Puts US Employees/Soldiers at Risk
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Last week, burglars broke into the offices of Triwest
Healthcare Alliance, a managed health care provider which is
contracted by the government to serve nearly 1.1 current and retired
members of the US military as well as their families. Among the items
taken: computers and hard drives containing the intimate personal
information of more than 500,000 active duty military personnel. The
stolen files were not encrypted, and contained Social Security numbers,
addresses, credit card numbers, and other details which would make it a
trivial task to commit identity theft.
According to a HREF="http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,1413,36%7E53%7E1075256%7E,00.html">Denver
Post article, no fraud has yet been linked to the burglaries; in
fact, the burglars may not even have realized at the time of the theft
that the hardware they stole contained such sensitive information.
However, because widespread press coverage of the theft may now have
alerted them to what they have, all of those served by Triwest should
take special precautions, such as putting a “lock” on their credit files
at the major national credit bureaus. Military personnel are often out of
touch with home (as will certainly be the case for the troops which the
US is already marshaling for war in Iraq), so identity thefts perpetrated
against them may go undiscovered for months.