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Judge Says Companies Don’t Need To Encrypt
John Stith
Staff Writer
2006-02-15
 Insider Reports RSS Feed
A federal judge in Minnesota decided companies don't necessarily need to encrypt data as part of their cyber security framework. Stacy Lawton Guin filed suit against Brazos Higher Education Service saying encryption should be part of the standard security. The judge said no.
 | | Judge Says Companies Don't Need To Encrypt |  |
U.S. District Judge Richard Kyle through out the case and Brazos' written security policy and other security measures for protecting their customers' information was adequate, though no encryption was in that security.
This situation stemmed from an all to common case of a stolen laptop, taken from the home of a Brazos employed who did the work telecommute thing. His job was to analyze loan portfolios. His house was burglarized and his laptop with all the information was stolen. The judge said the company, Brazos, had addressed security concerns "with reasonable care" and that encryption wasn't automatically necessary.
While Guin felt Brazos was required by law under the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act to make sure the information was encrypted, Judge Kyle thought otherwise suggesting the law in question doesn't specifically require encryption. The judge was right that the law doesn't specifically require encryption. But in so deciding, he let a lot companies off the hook.
With million of people losing their information last year to situations just like this one, encryption should be required in most cases, especially in cases dealing with financial institutions, when literally all of one's personal information would be subject to perusal. This decision is questionable because insufficient protections are perhaps the most common cause of security breaches. While often, the thieves are merely looking for a laptop; a qualified thief could easily get what they needed easily. It's only a matter of time before this happens.
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About the Author:
John is a staff writer for SecurityProNews covering cyber security.
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