RenovoData Services, Inc. » security breach

Chennai, India being used as e-waste dumping ground

renovods — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 15:04:50 +0000

127 tons of electronic junk… in just 2 months!!

“India’s Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) has intercepted five huge containers of old computer parts being dumped illegally in Chennai in just two months. Altogether it has found 127 tonnes of e-waste, much of which contains nickel, mercury and lead and could be linked to environmental damage as well as health concerns for”

Electronics Recycling Event – August 19th

renovods — Mon, 09 Aug 2010 16:23:01 +0000

RenovoData Services is partnering with The Eden Prairie Chamber of Commerce and the Edina Chamber of Commerce to provide Electronics Recycling and Free Hard Drive Shredding at the event.

When – August 19th 10:00 am to 1:00 pm
Where – Grace Church – 9301 Eden Prairie Road, Eden Prairie, MN 55347 (map)
What :

Recycling of PC’s & Laptops, Cell Phones, Small Printers, Small Office Devices at no charge.
Recycling of Monitors, Large Printers, TV’s and small appliances at 35 cents per pound.

This recycling event will take place in support of the E-Shared Partnership Event – Progressive Networking Luncheon…. see details below..

E-Squared Progressive Networking Luncheon

Date: August 19, 2010 11:30 AM – 1:00 PM

Registration: Click here to Register | or call (952)-944-2830
Price: Members: $25, Non-Members: $40

SPONSORSHIP AVAILABLE! Call Pat MulQueeny at (952) 944-2830 to find out how you can sponsor this double-sized event!

We are excited to announce a double-sized Progressive Networking Luncheon! We’ve partnered with the Edina Chamber of Commerce for yet another E-Squared Event. Join us at Grace Church (located at 9301 Eden Prairie Road in Eden Prairie) to be part of a networking experience unlike any other.

Progressive Networking involves meeting new contacts in a one-on-five setting. You’ll be seated with one group of contacts for the first course of the meal, and each person will have the opportunity to present a 60 second commercial about their business. You will then be moved to a whole new table with new contacts for the second and third courses of your meal. We will leave 15 minutes at the end of the event for informal networking with those you have not yet met.

Please come prepared with:

A 60 second commercial about your business
A large stack of business card

This event will have LIMITED SEATS available, and MUST start on time. Please sign up through this webpage, or call the Eden Prairie Chamber at (952) 944-2830 with questions. We hope to see you there!

Exclusive Data Breach Club. Do You Want To Be A Member?

renovods — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 14:01:11 +0000

The Defense Department, the Royal Bank of Scotland and even state and local governments all belong to an exclusive club, and this is a club to which you do not want to belong. All had severe security breaches, and sensitive data was released to the public.

Hard drives containing defense department information were purchased in 2009 at a street market in Ghana for $40, according to a documentary aired on PBS.

In a press release sent out on December 23, 2008, RBS Worldpay, the online payment arm of the Royal Bank of Scotland, admitted a hacker extracted personal information on 1.5 million card holders, including 1.1 million social security numbers.

In early 2009, the city of Muskogee, Oklahoma, discovered that a computer “zip” disk containing personal information has been in public circulation since 2000, according to the group Privacy Rights Clearinghouse.

It doesn’t take a lot of research to find incidents of severe security breaches by the U.S. government and companies. And that in itself is disturbing.

Producer/Correspondent Peter Klein and a team of graduate journalism students from the University of British Columbia set out to record the health and environmental hazards of e-waste around the world. The result was the documentary “Digital Dumping Ground” shown in June 2009 on PBS. But e-waste is not the only danger Klein and his team found.

In Ghana, they found hard drives from the United States and elsewhere sold in an open-air market. Here Klein and his team purchased for $40 a hard drive that came from Northrop Grumman, the U.S. defense contractor. The drive contained sensitive information about multi-million dollar contracts with the Pentagon and the Department of Homeland Security.

Some hard drives are sold to criminal gangs that mine them for credit card data, Social Security numbers and other identifying information.

In February 2009 the Ponemon Institute surveyed 43 companies that had suffered data breaches in 2008. “For a majority of companies, it was not their first time,” said Larry Ponemon. “Eighty-four percent of cases were repeat offenders, and only 16% were new.”

The loss of personal information and the possible consequences are not something the American public takes lightly when it affects them. In healthcare after a data breach, 6.5% of customers will leave their provider. In financial services 5.5% will end the business relationship.

Information gathered from:
Ponemon Institute; Fourth Annual Cost of a Data Breach Study, February 2009
PBS press release; “Ghana, Digital Dumping Ground”
RBS company press release
Privacy Rights Clearinghouse; A Chronology of Data Breaches