TSA loses hard drive with personal info By MATT APUZZO, Associated Press Writer




WASHINGTON - The Transportation Security Administration has lost a computer hard drive containing Social Security numbers, bank data and payroll information for about 100,000 employees.


Authorities realized Thursday the hard drive was missing from a controlled area at TSA headquarters. TSA Administrator Kip Hawley sent a letter to employees Friday apologizing for the lost data and promising to pay for one year of credit monitoring services.

"TSA has no evidence that an unauthorized individual is using your personal information, but we bring this incident to your attention so that you can be alert to signs of any possible misuse of your identity," Hawley wrote in the letter, which was obtained by The Associated Press. "We profoundly apologize for any inconvenience and concern that this incident has caused you."

The agency said it did not know whether the device is still within headquarters or was stolen.

TSA said it has asked the FBI and Secret Service to investigate and said it would fire anyone discovered to have violated the agency's data-protection policies.

In a statement released Friday night, the agency said the external "” or portable "” hard drive contained information on employees who worked for the Homeland Security agency from January 2002 until August 2005.

TSA, a division of the Homeland Security Department, employs about 50,000 people and is responsible for security of the nation's transportation systems, including airports and train stations.

"It's seems like there's a problem with security inside Homeland Security and that makes no sense," said James Slade, a TSA screener and the executive vice president of the National Treasury Employees Union chapter at John F. Kennedy International Airport. "That's scary. That's my identity. And now who has a hold of it? So many things go on in your mind."

The agency added a section to its Web site Friday night addressing the data security breach and directing people to information about identity theft.

Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (news, bio, voting record), D-Texas, whose Homeland Security subcommittee oversees the TSA, promised to hold hearings on the security breach. She said Homeland Security buildings are part of the critical infrastructure the agency is charged with protecting.

"We should expect it to be secure," she said.

House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie G. Thompson, D-Miss., called the security breach "a terrible and unfortunate blow" for an agency he said already suffered from low morale.

It's the latest mishap for the government involving computer data. Last year, a laptop with information for more than 26.5 million military personnel, was stolen from a Veterans Affairs Department employee's home. Law enforcement officials recovered the laptop, and the FBI said Social Security numbers and other personal data had not been copied.

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Associated Press writer Ted Bridis contributed to this report.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070505/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/tsa_missing_data

Probe launched into missing TSA computer drive
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By Thomas Frank, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON "” Federal authorities have launched a "full-blown criminal investigation" into the disappearance of a computer drive holding personal and banking records of 100,000 Transportation Security Administration employees, agency Administrator Kip Hawley said Monday.
"We're doing a full-court press on this," Hawley told TSA employees in a conference call that USA TODAY was able to listen to.

Hawley's comments downplayed the possibility that the portable hard drive had been lost from TSA headquarters in Arlington, Va., on Thursday. The TSA had said Friday that it was "unclear" whether the device was "still within headquarters or was stolen."

Agency spokeswoman Ellen Howe acknowledged Hawley's comments and added that "nothing has been ruled out," including the possibility the hard drive was lost.

On Monday, TSA employees questioned how the drive went missing and whether it would expose the identities of the thousands of armed air marshals, who ride undercover on airplanes to thwart terrorists. Air marshals, who are TSA employees, fear what someone could do with their names, birth dates and Social Security numbers "” data that were on the hard drive.

FIND MORE STORIES IN: Transportation Security Administration | Probe | TSA | Law Enforcement Officers | Cris Soulia
"If that information is out there, it's very easy to find out who they are," said John Adler, executive vice president of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association, whose members include air marshals. Adler said terrorists could use personnel information to find where air marshals live, photograph them and disseminate the photos.

Hawley said air marshals' security "was one of our first concerns" but downplayed the risk to them. The TSA said on its website that "without extensive knowledge of TSA's human resource system, it is extremely difficult to determine what positions employees on the missing hard drive have."

The TSA has not ruled out the possibility that an insider took the drive.

Aviation-security consultant Rich Roth said the data theft "shouldn't affect the air marshals at all." Terrorists who are determined to spot air marshals can simply watch passengers boarding planes early, he said.

The FBI and Secret Service have joined the investigation, which began Thursday after employees in the TSA personnel office who frequently use the hard drive found it missing.

Howe, the TSA spokeswoman, said the drive is about the size of a desk telephone.

Paul Stephens, a policy analyst at the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, a consumer advocacy group, questioned why a federal security agency would store sensitive information on "something that could be carried away in a briefcase" and not on a larger, less-portable device. External hard drives store data such as text files and photographs and are plugged into a computer.

Cris Soulia, a TSA screener in San Diego and a former Navy computer technician, said he was "dumbfounded" that the agency would store personnel records on a portable device.

"That's really irresponsible," Soulia said.

Howe declined to address why the records were stored on an external hard drive, saying it is "an element of an ongoing investigation."

Stephens said stealing hard drives "is a bit unusual" and usually indicates that "the purpose of the theft was to obtain the data." Many data breaches are the unintentional result of someone stealing a computer to sell it and the computer happens to hold personnel information, he said.

The clearinghouse has tracked hundreds of security breaches that exposed 154 million data records.

Posted 1h 4m ago
Updated 37m ago

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2007-05-07-tsa-probe_N.htm?csp=34