cyber security: [august 2008]
Published: 07/24/2008
- Personal Information of 259 University of Houston Students Exposed Online
From the article of the same name by: Kever, Jeannie, Houston Chronicle - The Liberty Coalition discovered the names and Social Security numbers of 259 University of Houston (UH) students on a Web site, according to a July 24 statement by UH. The advocacy group discovered the breach in May during a routine search, and believes the information has been online since October 2005 when a professor posted grades. The university removed the information from the servers and hesitated to announce the breach until recently in order to ensure no data remained on any search engines. It is possible some personal data still exists on individual hard drives, but both the Liberty Coalition and UH believe the information was not accessed by unauthorized users. "If you are a victim, that's hardly any consolation," says the coalition's Aaron Titus. "Once you put information online, you throw it to the Internet winds, and you never quite get it back." The university is in the process of notifying all students affected by the exposure. Meanwhile, the Liberty Coalition offers a search site, www.ssnbreach.org, where anyone can run their Social Security number to see if it is online.
