For Sale: My Name
I'm not sure which came first: the catchy ad campaign or the idea for a new internet business. You've seen the ads where the CEO of the business advertises his Social Security number and dares anybody to try to steal his identity. I'll have to admit it caught my eye.
I don't have to start a company so I can give away my Social Security identification.
Or.. my home address ...
my date of birth ...
and who-knows-what else.
What should be one of the most secure places in the world has bent over, spread it's cheeks, and revealed all of that data on me and thousands of others. Oak Ridge National Labratories- the place where they make a-bomb material has been hacked, and the personal information of thousands of contract employees has been stolen.
In the 1990's I worked at Y-12 as a sub contractor.
Before you get any ideas that someone would allow me near nuclear material, let me assure you that the work had absolutely nothing to do with a-bombs. Although my work took place in one of the buildings at the complex, I was a writer for Lockheed Martin for a transportation project. However, the assigned workplace was in one of the buildings at the huge complex.
It was like working in Oz. Pipes and machinery were all over the place. It gave me the heebie jeebies just wondering what the people on the lower floor might be doing with scrap Plutonium, or Cesium dust, or leftover Uranium Hydroxide. But I should have been more worried about the propeller heads working the computers.
I got a letter in the mail a couple of weeks ago that told me I was on a list of workers that had been hacked from the ORNL computers. It had been ten years. They had thoughtfully kept my extremely low-level security clearance information for a decade, just in case someone wanted to steal fresh names and addresses for new credit accounts.
How can this happen? And why would it be possible for somebody- no matter how talented they are- to hack into Oak Ridge computers. This is not the Visa Credit Card list. This is not even my credit union. This is Oak Ridge, for Pete's sake. This is the place that makes the stuff that screws on top of the rockets that could spell the end of humanity. And they cannot even keep an employees list a secret ??!?
This either speaks poorly of Oak Ridge security, or says hackers are some pretty smart cookies. Let's just hope ORNL does a little better at keeping the other stuff secret...you know, the stuff that could render a large piece of real estate un-inhabitable for say, the next forty thousand years.
I can only hope my information was hacked by some pimply faced high schooler who just wanted to see if they could do it, and not some criminal bent on using every last name on the list to open an American Express Black Card account.
Next time I need some extra work, I'm going to call the zoo. I hear the chimps are pretty good system administrators.
I don't have to start a company so I can give away my Social Security identification.
Or.. my home address ...
my date of birth ...
and who-knows-what else.
What should be one of the most secure places in the world has bent over, spread it's cheeks, and revealed all of that data on me and thousands of others. Oak Ridge National Labratories- the place where they make a-bomb material has been hacked, and the personal information of thousands of contract employees has been stolen.
In the 1990's I worked at Y-12 as a sub contractor.
Before you get any ideas that someone would allow me near nuclear material, let me assure you that the work had absolutely nothing to do with a-bombs. Although my work took place in one of the buildings at the complex, I was a writer for Lockheed Martin for a transportation project. However, the assigned workplace was in one of the buildings at the huge complex.
It was like working in Oz. Pipes and machinery were all over the place. It gave me the heebie jeebies just wondering what the people on the lower floor might be doing with scrap Plutonium, or Cesium dust, or leftover Uranium Hydroxide. But I should have been more worried about the propeller heads working the computers.
I got a letter in the mail a couple of weeks ago that told me I was on a list of workers that had been hacked from the ORNL computers. It had been ten years. They had thoughtfully kept my extremely low-level security clearance information for a decade, just in case someone wanted to steal fresh names and addresses for new credit accounts.
How can this happen? And why would it be possible for somebody- no matter how talented they are- to hack into Oak Ridge computers. This is not the Visa Credit Card list. This is not even my credit union. This is Oak Ridge, for Pete's sake. This is the place that makes the stuff that screws on top of the rockets that could spell the end of humanity. And they cannot even keep an employees list a secret ??!?
This either speaks poorly of Oak Ridge security, or says hackers are some pretty smart cookies. Let's just hope ORNL does a little better at keeping the other stuff secret...you know, the stuff that could render a large piece of real estate un-inhabitable for say, the next forty thousand years.
I can only hope my information was hacked by some pimply faced high schooler who just wanted to see if they could do it, and not some criminal bent on using every last name on the list to open an American Express Black Card account.
Next time I need some extra work, I'm going to call the zoo. I hear the chimps are pretty good system administrators.
Recent Comments
It was great seeing you on Friday when
Thanks ag