FBI adds Iomega hard drive to most wanted list

Have you seen this drive? The FBI -- you know, the people in charge of your "permanent record" -- is offering up to $25,000 for information leading to the return of a missing "Iomega hard drive." Apparently, the drive contains personal information on "at least a half-million people." It was reported missing from the Birmingham, Alabama Veterans Administration Medical Center where it was used by an employee in medical research to backup data. That's right, medical research. So if you've seen the drive then by all means, let us know. We don't want the reward, we're just curious about the super-soldier hallucinogens developed by the VA's hippy chemists back in the late 60s... that's all.

[Thanks, Chris]

[CowboyGA @ Feb 22nd 2007 10:43AM]

It doesn't surprise me that this data theft keeps happening - it can't really be avoided. What bothers me is how the situations are handled. Discretion would be wise in chasing after the theives, as opposed to making it sound like the investigation involves taping missing flyers on light posts. Maybe they could put a "Have you seen me?" picture on a milk carton.

[wisher @ Feb 22nd 2007 10:46AM]

How did they lost the hard disk?
Win Addict

[mojo @ Feb 22nd 2007 10:23AM]

Seriously.... "How did they lost the hard disk?" You mean, "how did they _lose_ the hard disk."

[Xavier Gill @ Feb 22nd 2007 10:49AM]

"how did they lost the hard disk?"

Good England! ;)

[Mike Mielke @ Feb 22nd 2007 11:17AM]

HAHAH i found holy wow im good

http://www.iomega.com/direct/products/family.jsp?FOLDER%3C%3Efolder_id=27290741&bmUID=1172161002321

[Matt B @ Feb 22nd 2007 11:22AM]

This is hardly surprising being that the FBI lost or had stolen an average of 11 laptops a month for over 3 straight years. oh and weapons too.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2007/02/13/MNG62O3NOU1.DTL

I'm sgtarting to think the B in FBI stands for Butterfingers.

[Mike Mielke @ Feb 22nd 2007 11:24AM]

it sounds like they do it on purpose if anyone has read Killing Time By Caleb Carr they could be "Losing" track of their property or purposely setting it out there for people like us to find and discovery "secrets" that are indeed not even secrets just fabricated details of a hoax

[Tim @ Feb 22nd 2007 11:34AM]

I had no idea so many english professors read engadget!

[jav @ Feb 22nd 2007 11:47AM]

so... its only 0.05cents each ...

just my 2 cents...making me a 0.07 cent guy!!!

[jav @ Feb 22nd 2007 12:07PM]

i mean dollars.... too late...

[souravgh @ Feb 22nd 2007 12:22PM]

how much data was in that drive again?

[Aaron Falcone @ Feb 22nd 2007 12:20PM]

check eBay...I wouldn't be surprised if it showed up there...formatted and listed as a used item...

[Phatman @ Feb 22nd 2007 1:22PM]

Anytime you keep a lot of sensitive data in one place, you take more risk of that data being compromised. Common sense right?

There needs to be policies put into place to limit the data in any single location (zip drive, laptop, whatever) to only what is absolutely required for the task. (medical researh in this case) Instead, I'm guessing that this had a whole lot more data about each person than what was really necessary. That's data loss that could have been avoided by better policies in the first place!

[SubGenius @ Feb 22nd 2007 2:01PM]

It was stolen by one of the super-soldiers they created back in the 60s.

[BAMF @ Feb 22nd 2007 2:43PM]

I hope that all of these HDDs and laptops are encrypted.

Here's what I don't understand: Why keep all of this sensitive info on laptops and external HDDs? Why not store it all on a central server under lock and key and equip these laptops with cellular data cards. Make the users log in via VPN to access/store info. Seems like it would be much less likely to fall into the wrong hands. Sure, data plans are expensive, but it's the fricken FBI. If they can afford to keep replacing lost/stolen laptops, I'm sure they've got the coinage for cellular cards!

[Aizen @ Feb 22nd 2007 4:50PM]

"super-soldier hallucinogens developed by the VA's hippy chemists back in the late 60s... that's all."

Jacob's Ladder? lol

[drumr @ Feb 22nd 2007 7:10PM]

i have one of these omega externals... it's 250 gb

[Rob @ Feb 22nd 2007 9:17PM]

It's funny how the article implies FBI data security is lax when a VA hospital loses an external drive. Far as I know, they're 2 different entities, aren't they?

[haly @ Feb 23rd 2007 8:38AM]

Well, we have to consider the fact that it wasn't the FBI who had the data... it was the VA... and the VA generally is not known for it's quality service and staff...

It's simply the FBI that wants the data back...

Also, living in the same town and seeing the state of most of the VA facilities here in B'ham makes it quite clear that any Joe Schmoe could walk in and have free reign...

Missing data? not surprising.

Probably some hick picked it up, and it using the drive to either prop open a door or store his AOL e-mails... I think they should cut their losses and move on...

[Zequel @ Feb 23rd 2007 9:48AM]

To reiterate Phatman's point, wtf was personal information doing on an external drive?? Every time I hear about social security #s or credit cards being stolen from a laptop or external drive, I'm like WTF?? What the hell was the person doing with ss #s or credit card #s on a laptop?? There is NO reason for them to have either. You don't need those #s to unique identify a customer/client/taxpayer and you certainly are not adding them up. Assign it an internal ID, leave the data on a secure server, when the worker is done working on his or her copy of the table, you can always link it back using a db join and update the secured data. Just give the worker what they need. IT directors need to be fired everytime this happens.

[NightFox @ Feb 23rd 2007 3:07PM]

Honestly... if there is that much sensitive data on a drive, not only should the drive be physically locked down, it should also be encrypted...there is no excuse.

[desaparecido @ Feb 23rd 2007 8:11PM]

Yeah this data theft situation is getting very interesting.

Apparently, this theft is part of a rash of data thefts. One website has been tracking the massive amount of these thefts and the webmaster postulates that these thefts may be an illegal government program to populate a kind of massive surveillance database used on the citizens of the United States.

http://www.waynemadsenreport.com/Datathefts.php

If this this story is true, could these illegal thefts be used as part of criminal database that use agreements between the United States and other countries; and used to spy on citizens traveling to and from partnered countries?

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2007/02/23/MNGCAO9NSB1.DTL

What I think is interesting is that if these databases are to be integrated into one giant database, you would need expertise from the most knowledgable people available.

Jim Gray, who has gone missing, was a microsoft "database guru". From what I have found on the Internet, he was working on projects associated with using large databases such as the controversial databases being constructed by the NSA to monitor millions of phone calls:

http://www.gcn.com/print/25_13/40827-1.html

I guess if one could prove that the data used against you was stolen, I suppose you find in a court of law that stolen data used against you would be illegal.