PRIVACY + SECURITY BLOG

News, Developments, and Insights

high-tech technology background with eyes on computer display

Why the Anthem Data Breach Is Needlessly Harmful

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By Daniel J. Solove

Recently, Anthem, one of the largest health insurance providers, suffered a massive data breach involving personal data on up to 80 million people. According to Anthem, the data breached includes “names, dates of birth, member ID/ social security numbers, addresses, phone numbers, email addresses and employment information.”

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The Funniest Hacker Stock Photos

stock photos

By Daniel J. Solove

 

I produce computer-based privacy and data security training, so I’m often in the hunt for stock photos. One of the hardest things in the world to do is to find a stock photo of a hacker that doesn’t look absolutely ridiculous.

I’ve gone through hundreds of hacker stock photos, and I’ve discovered some that are so absurdly funny that they are true classics and deserve to be celebrated in a hall of fame. So I bought some of these gems to share them with you — because if there’s any sense of justice in the universe, when so much thought, creativity, and effort goes into a stock photo, it deserves to be sold.

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The Worst Password Ever Created

worst password ever created

by Daniel J. Solove

People create some very bad passwords. In the list of the most popular passwords of 2014, all of them are terrible. Just look at the top 10:

  1. 123456
  2. password
  3. 12345
  4. 12345678
  5. Qwerty
  6. 123456789
  7. 1234
  8. baseball
  9. dragon
  10. football

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Drones, Data Breaches, Cramming, and Other Privacy + Security Updates

drones and data breaches

by Daniel J. Solove

This post is co-authored with Professor Paul M. Schwartz.

This post is part of a post series where we round up some of the interesting news and resources we’re finding. For a PDF version of this post, and for archived issues of previous posts, click here.

We became quite busy after the last update, so we’re a bit backlogged. We are catching up on developments late last year and we have a lot of material. We will release the next issue soon, as there is too much material to fit into this issue.

For a PDF version of this post, click here.

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The Undying Death of Privacy

will privacy ever stop dyingby Daniel J. Solove

“Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated.”
— Privacy

I am growing weary of hearing news of the end of privacy or the death of privacy. Like news of the apocalypse, it seems as though declarations of the looming end of privacy are endless.

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Why All Law Schools Should Teach Privacy Law — and Why Many Don’t

why law schools should teach privacy

by Daniel J. Solove

Since 2000, I have taught a law school course in information privacy law. When I started teaching, I could count the number of law schools that had such a course on one hand.

Today, by my rough estimate, I believe that the course is offered in about 40-50 law schools.

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Notable Privacy and Security Books 2014

Notable Privacy Security Books 2014 - TeachPrivacy 01

There were quite a number of books published about privacy and security issues last year, and I would like to highlight a few notable ones. A few books came out in late 2014 and have an early 2015 publication date. I’m including them here. The books are in no particular order.

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The Sony Data Breach: 3 Painful Lessons

 

sony blog 1

by Daniel J. Solove

The Sony data breach is an exclamation mark on a year that is already known as the” Year of the Data Breach.” This data breach is the kind that makes even the least squeamish avert their eyes and wince. There are at least three things that this breach can teach us:

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Privacy and Security Developments 2014 Issue 1

privacy and security update

by Daniel J. Solove

Issue 2014 No. 1

This post is co-authored with Professor Paul M. Schwartz.

We spend a lot of time staying up to date so we can update our casebooks and reference books, so we thought we would share with you some of the interesting news and resources we’re finding. We plan to post a series of posts like this one throughout the year.

For a PDF version of this post, click here.

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The $500,000 Value of Data Security Awareness Training

data security awareness training

by Daniel J. Solove

It has long been difficult to quantify the ROI of data security awareness training.

But finally, I have been able to locate a number. According to a 2014 PricewaterhouseCoopers study: “The financial value of employee awareness is even more compelling. Organizations that do not have security awareness programs—in particular, training for new employees—report significantly higher average financial losses from cybersecurity incidents. Companies without security training for new hires reported average annual financial losses of $683,000, while those do have training said their average financial losses totaled $162,000.”

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