The Canadian Privacy Law Blog: Developments in privacy law and writings of a Canadian privacy lawyer, containing information related to the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (aka PIPEDA) and other Canadian and international laws.

Search this blog

Recent Posts

On Twitter

About this page and the author

The author of this blog, David T.S. Fraser, is a Canadian privacy lawyer who practices with the firm of McInnes Cooper. He is the author of the Physicians' Privacy Manual. He has a national and international practice advising corporations and individuals on matters related to Canadian privacy laws.

For full contact information and a brief bio, please see David's profile.

Please note that I am only able to provide legal advice to clients. I am not able to provide free legal advice. Any unsolicited information sent to David Fraser cannot be considered to be solicitor-client privileged.

David Fraser's Facebook profile

Privacy Calendar

Archives

Links

Subscribe with Bloglines

RSS Atom Feed

RSS FEED for this site

Subscribe to this Blog as a Yahoo! Group/Mailing List
Powered by groups.yahoo.com

Subscribe with Bloglines
Add to Technorati Favorites!

Blogs I Follow

Small Print

The views expressed herein are solely the author's and should not be attributed to his employer or clients. Any postings on legal issues are provided as a public service, and do not constitute solicitation or provision of legal advice. The author makes no claims, promises or guarantees about the accuracy, completeness, or adequacy of the information contained herein or linked to. Nothing herein should be used as a substitute for the advice of competent counsel.

This web site is presented for informational purposes only. These materials do not constitute legal advice and do not create a solicitor-client relationship between you and David T.S. Fraser. If you are seeking specific advice related to Canadian privacy law or PIPEDA, contact the author, David T.S. Fraser.

Tuesday, November 22, 2005

Incident: Missing laptop affects 500 Safeway employees 

From the Santa Cruz Sentinel:

Safeway discloses possible security compromise - By Gwen Mickelson - Sentinel staff writer - November 22, 2005:

About 500 Safeway employees in Santa Cruz County could be affected by a company laptop theft.

In October, Pleasanton-based Safeway Inc. notified employees in California and Hawaii that certain personal information may have been compromised when a company laptop was stolen in August from a division director's home, along with other unrelated items.

In a letter to Safeway employees dated Oct. 17, Human Resources Director Bob Carlson said the computer contained several reports that include names, Social Security numbers, hire dates and work locations for a number of Safeway employees. The computer was protected by a power-on password, the company said, but nonetheless recommended that employees place a fraud alert on their credit files and request copies of their credit reports every three months for the next year.

No information breaches have been reported, spokeswoman Jennifer Webber said.

...

But union leaders criticized the company, asking why it took so long to notify employees and why the information was stored on a laptop.

...

Members of the union, which represents about 1,200 employees in Monterey, Santa Cruz and San Benito counties, "don't want to hear 'no one's been compromised yet,'" he said. "They want to hear 'we're sorry, we apologize for the 60-day delay, we assure you you're not going to pay out-of-pocket for one thing, we've put measures in place so that this won't happen again.'"

...

Briley said the password protection doesn't soothe his members, and said he wants assurance from Safeway that if anyone does fall victim to identity theft down the road, the company would take responsibility and help out.

He criticized the grocer for keeping members information on a laptop, saying he'd "bet a hundred-dollar bill" that Safeway Club Card data the company keeps on consumers is "kept on a safer computer than my members' information."

Webber called Safeway security processes "incredibly tight," and said procedures "have been and will be to keep information as secure as possible."

...

Labels: , ,

Links to this post:

Create a Link

This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours? Creative Commons License
The Canadian Privacy Law Blog is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 Canada License. lawyer blogs