[LINK] News email blunder

[Ross Johnson]

Hmmm. This is perhaps why the government is treating privacy
as a futile exercise. Once it's public it ain't private no more
- it's one strike and your out, and that strike can be made by
any one of hundreds or thousands of holders of private information.

In these cases it's not the email addresses themselves that
are private, but the inferred information (who owns that?)
that associates the person with the business or organisation.

Ironically, we see government email carrying notices designed
to hold anyone who might erroneously receive sensitive information
legally responsible if they use it.

Is there anthing in the privacy legislation that makes it illegal
to use information acquired as a result of accidental disclosure?

In a perfectly networked world it would be possible for an
individual to maintain an audit of _every single_ use of information
belonging to them, and to control all aspects of it's use.
We're a long way from that though, but I think that technology
rather than law is the way this problem will ultimately be solved.
Am I stating the obvious here?

Ross Johnson

Howard Lowndes wrote:
> 
> A building society with which I have an account was promoting its new
> on-line service due in the future.  When the service was ready they
> emailed all those clients who had expressed an interest in the online
> service, and put the address list in the CC instead of the BCC.
> Interesting who has accounts with that building society, especially in a
> small town where you know many people.  They were most apologetic when I
> pointed out their error, but I didn't see too many heads roll.
> 
> --
> Howard.
> ______________________________________________________
> LANNet Computing Associates <http://www.lannet.com.au>
> 
> On Sat, 28 Oct 2000, Michael Biber wrote:
> 
> > A few months ago, my company responded to a tender request from a large NSW
> > Government Department. Due to the same kind of News blunder, an email with
> > tender clarification questions arrived along with the email addresses of
> > more than 80 companies that also responded to the RFT. A lovely piece of
> > competitive intelligence.
> >
> > This list included two of our subcontractors who didn't tell us they were in
> > other consortia for this tender. Very useful.
> >
> > Cheers
> > Mike Biber
> > Asia Pacific Networx
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: owner-link@www.anu.edu.au [mailto:owner-link@www.anu.edu.au]On
> > Behalf Of Bill D'Arcy
> > Sent: Friday, 27 October 2000 13:01
> > To: link@www.anu.edu.au
> > Subject: [LINK] News email blunder
> >
> >
> > News Limited admits email blunder
> > Thousands of personal email addresses have been revealed without
> > permission on the Internet after a mistake by Victoria's Sunday Herald Sun
> > newspaper. An email sent this week to remind readers about the Herald
> > Sun's upcoming 'Olympic Dream' event inadvertently included the names and
> > email addresses of at least 8,000 recipients. The News Limited publication
> > has admitted to the error, saying it was an accident.
> > http://newswire.com.au/apcweb/news.nsf/HTML/AllHeadlines/43CC96344AA32A4ACA2
> > 5698
> > 4001A775A
> >
> > Bill D'Arcy
> >