HIV status of over 14,000 people leaked online, Singapore authorities say
edition.cnn.com
edition.cnn.com
Typically in this use case, you'd think the system would be set up such that users can only query full individual records if they work on the case itself OR limited (retracted) records for the entire population.
That's how we handle our customer database. If you work as a customer service agent, you can pull the entire record of a single customer but not more than 1 at a time and rate limited. For out data analytics team, you have access to all the records without the personal information (users are given a random unique userID. no names, addresses, emails, or phone numbers). The rationale is simple, we don't want anyone to be able to simply download our customer database and spam them.
In this case, the consequences are much worse for the people affected.
Easily said, but even the NSA couldn't protect from an insider obtaining tons of internal documents. Nor could google prevent the theft of LIDAR sensor trade secrets.
These access issues [commonly] aren't bugs, they're laziness. Shared volumes to speed up collaboration, no granular permissions, or relying on threat of access audit to keep people in line. In most of these networks, mechanisms exist that could have limited access to those that need it.
And part of that is the technological culture of how we've been taught to share files. We still commonly rely on third parties to handle big transfers.
For me it looks far too sensitive to have it as one central database. (... all assuming that it wasn't compiled by those who leaked it.)
edit: "sensible" doesn't actually mean what I thought it does. Replaced it with "sensitive".
Yeah, and the crazies in the German government really want to create a centralized digital registry for health data. Cases like this show what a very bad idea this is.
We have had very positive experiences with labeling people. While we had to do this in an analog way the last time, the label itself really helped a lot with "dealing" with people who were a problem.
I think if we would make registers like these again, modern technology would really help us to be even more efficient the next time.
Don't see what could go wrong, especially when political leaders change etc.
/s
It was a pretty dark chapter. Not only for Germany and Europe in general, but also for the IBM Corporation[1]
Forward thinking? Never know when they might need a list of people by religion, ethnicity, invalid status. Better to have and not use, than to need and not have it...or something :)
I think it's 1% of your income or something like that which is collected by the state for the church. (That itself is often discussed in Germany, as state and church should obviously not be mixed...)
But you can "leave" the church, it costs something like 40 Euro for the administrative action and that's it. No discussion whatsoever and you can keep your money. :-D
Well, right now it is. The original registry OP is referring to was probably not started to identify and exterminate people who were Jewish, but started for some more innocent reason and then abused when the wrong party assumed power.
But as the Nazis had more and more influence laws ("Nürnberger Gesetze") were passed which required Jewish people to mark their shops and register themselves as Jewish etc. pp.
Also denunciations and more from neighbors happened, after Jews were declared "enemies" of the state, so everything came together.
edit: But potential misuse of any kind of registers by whomever is obviously the strongest point against those registers after all. Right-wing parties are always eager to have such things for obvious reasons.
If you are, you will pay a "church tax" like 1% of your income. If you are not, you don't have to pay that tax.
So it's more about tax collection and distribution than about anything else.
Sarcasm aside, Bavaria passed a law this past year which allows police to use DNA evidence to infer physical characteristics about a suspect's appearance. The same law also allows police to arrest people they suspect may commit a crime in the near future.
So, this principle is still alive and well in Germany.