Monday Morning News Kick Off: FBI Investigates iPad Breach; iPad Breach Raises ‘Data Breach Concerns’ to Higher Level

Welcome to the Monday Morning News Kick Off post from the ITAC blog. Nothing will bump up the idea of data breaches in our national conscience than an incident involving an Apple product. Did anyone notice that a data breach also happened at Penn State last week? Most likely not, but on a more positive note – at least the iPad breach will make data breaches more of a priority for many organizations. Anyhow, enough venting, and on with the Monday morning news round up.

FBI Investigates iPad Data Breach
FBI officials confirmed last week that the bureau has opened an investigation into data breaches involving AT&T and Apple’s recently released iPad. “The FBI is aware of these possible computer intrusions and has opened an investigation to address the potential cyber threat,” said Special Agent Jason Pack, an FBI spokesman. The investigation is being overseen by agents from the FBI’s Washington field office, according to FBI officials. AT&T confirmed the data breach last Wednesday, saying user e-mail accounts may have been compromised. Read the full ABC News article here.

Watchdog: Apple, Google Data Breaches “Worrisome”
US watchdog has described the recent data privacy problems to hit Google and Apple as “worrisome.” Last month, Google’s Street View car was revealed to have collected Wi-Fi data as it drove around cities snapping photos. And last week, a hacking group leaked the email addresses of over 100,000 Apple iPad owners in the US, seemingly to prove a point about security flaws in the way the AT&T network handled such data. “The Google and AT&T incidents are different kinds of intrusions, each worrisome in its own way, and each with a different remedy,” wrote Joel Gurin, head of the consumer and governmental affairs bureau at the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC), in a blog post. Read the full PC Pro article here.

FCC Turns Focus To Cyber Security Following iPad and Google Incidents
The U.S. Federal Communications Commission says cyber security is now a “high priority” following security breaches in Apple’s iPad and Google’s collection of private WiFi data. In May, it was revealed Google had collected private information sent over WiFi as its Street View cars drove around collecting data for Google Maps. And this week the FBI announced it had opened an investigation into a security breach of Apple’s iPad following confirmation that the email addresses of dozens of CEOs, military officials, top politicians and media personalities have been compromised. FCC Chief of the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau, Joel Gurin, said the iPad incident appears to be a classic security breach. Read the full NewsRoom article here.

10 of the Top Data Breaches of the Decade
The Internet cried foul last week when news broke that an AT&T security breach exposed the e-mail addresses of at least 100,000 owners of Apple’s iPad 3G. But industry observers are quick to point out that this is hardly the first — and hardly the worst — data breach that the tech world has ever seen. “The fact is 114,000 is an impressive number and they’re e-mail addresses. … [But] that’s almost public information,” said Dan Tynan, a technology reporter and co-author of the technology humor site eSarcasm. Some companies publish relevant e-mail addresses on their sites, and even when companies don’t outright reveal addresses, it’s often easy to guess them, he said. “What these guys did was something that spammers do every single day,” he said. Read the full ABC News post here.

Cybersecurity Legislation Seeks Emergency Power
A new Congressional cyber security proposal would give the president emergency powers to protect critical private networks under attack, but the bill’s sponsors insisted it does not allow the government to take control of any private cyber-network. Senate Homeland Security Committee Chairman Joseph Lieberman, I-Connecticut, who helped create the legislation, said the president could order a patch or tell a cyber network to stop receiving incoming data from a particular country when critical infrastructure in the private sector such as the electrical grid or financial grid is threatened or attacked. A company that complies with the order would be given immunity from any liability for any consequences of the action. Read the full CNN article here.