Hard Drive Bought at Staples Contains Sensitive Files
A Canadian office supply store Staples is undergoing scrunity after selling a hard-drive on clearance containing the personal files of a Carleton University political science professor who returned the hard drive to the store earlier.
This is similar to last month’s post: Is Your Personal Information Safe in a Weak Economy? — except Staples has no recession to blame — it has merely been careless with the way it handled this returned device.
According to Staples, a policy is in place to wipe data from devices before reselling them:
“We can advise you that all returned items that have memory are required to be wiped before being resold.”
However, a warning on the bottom of every receipt reads:
“Customers are responsible for the removal and backup of all data (including personal information) from returned products.”
In the end, it all goes back to educating the user. But how many of your friends, families, and coworkers would think about researching and downloading “secure deletion” software if they were in the same situation?
Certainly only the most tech- and privacy-savvy people I know.
Source: Canada.com.
Email, Print, Bookmark, or Share!
