http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/02/25/ernst_young_mcnealy/
[If E&Y (or any business!) invested less than $50 in a little
physical security, stories like this would be less commonplace.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00004Z6ON/c4iorg - WK]
By Ashlee Vance in Mountain View
25th February 2006
Exclusive Ernst and Young should go ahead and pony up for its own
suite of transparency services. The accounting firm failed to disclose
a high profile loss of customer data until being confronted by The
Register.
Ernst and Young has lost a laptop containing data such as the social
security numbers of its customers. One of the people affected by the
data loss appears to be Sun Microsystems CEO Scott McNealy, who was
notified that his social security number and personal information have
been compromised. While pushing all out transparency for its
customers, Ernst and Young failed to cop to the security breach until
contacted by us.
"We deeply regret that a laptop containing confidential client
information was stolen, in what appears to be a random act, from the
locked car of one of our employees," said Ernst and Young spokesman
Charles Perkins. "The security and confidentiality of our client
information is of critical importance to us. The computer was
password-protected, and we have no reason to believe the data itself
was targeted or that the information was accessed by anyone. We are
notifying those clients whose information was contained on the
computer."
Ernst and Young declined to comment on whether or not McNealy was
affected.
However, at lat week's RSA security conference, McNealy noted that he
received an e-mail from an "anonymous partner" detailing a loss of his
private data. "We determined that your name and social security number
were among the data (lost)," the partner wrote to McNealy.
"This is an organization that we spend an enormous amount of money on
to determine whether we are Sarbanes-Oxley compliant," McNealy said.
Digging through Sun's financial filings, you'll discover that Ernst
and Young serves as the company's auditor and handles Sarbanes-Oxley
consulting for Sun. A spokesman at Sun confirmed that Ernst and Young
is still the company's auditor but declined to out the firm that lost
McNealy's data.
It's difficult to determine how massive the Ernst and Young data loss
was in this case. Although, today we learned that a Deloitte and
Touche CD containing information on McAfee employees was left in an
airline seat pocket, exposing the social security numbers of close to
9,000 workers. Certainly, a laptop loss could be as damaging.
Ernst and Young declined to return our phone calls seeking more
information about the breach and why it has "no reason to believe" the
password could be cracked. It makes no mention of stronger security
than simple password protection. The company only sent along the
earlier statement.
Ernst and Young has littered its web site with transparency advice for
customers. The company, however, failed to make a public notification
of the data loss.
Such secrecy seems quite rich given the current climate surrounding
security and the protection of customer data. One might ask how a
company such as Ernst and Young can judge the transparency of Sun or
other customers.
Then again, the accounting firm could just stick with the "You have no
privacy. Get over it" line. ®
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