Privacy

Brian Prawitz believed it was a simple request: Show me the e-mail.

The answer was, sure, but it will cost you $7,800.

Welcome to the electronic world of Oregon public records.

Millions of commuters could have their private movements around cities secretly monitored under new counter-terrorism powers being sought by the security services.

Records of journeys made by people using smart cards that allow 17 million Britons to travel by underground, bus and train with a single swipe at the ticket barrier are among a welter of private information held by the state to which MI5 and police counter-terrorism officers want access in order to help identify patterns of suspicious behaviour.

MTV Networks has told 5,000 employees their Social Security numbers and other personal data may have been accessed after computers were breached.

In a letter sent Friday to the workers, the Viacom-owned MTV said it was taking "every appropriate action" to protect data in the future. The company did not say how the systems were breached or when the break-in happened.

For its part, parent company Viacom said police have launched a criminal investigation and is offering credit-monitoring.

The text of an e-mail from Czech Police President Oldrich Martinu to MP Jan Vidim about possible suppression of extremist views on the Internet has been released on the National Resistance neo-Nazi movement's website, the iDnes.cz server writes today.

Police have been investigating the case.

In the e-mail written last summer, Martinu answered Vidim's (senior ruling Civic Democrats, ODS) question whether it is possible to block the Odpor.org and Vzdelavaci-institut.com websites that include racist views.

The Home Office has launched an investigation into how an optical disc holding confidential information was discovered hidden beneath the keyboard of a laptop bought on the online auction site eBay.

The disc was found by technicians when the computer was taken into a small IT repair company for service.

The laptop had been bought on eBay and taken to Leapfrog Computer repairs in Westhoughton, near Bolton, Greater Manchester, on Tuesday morning.

LIPSTICK on collars or smelling of a strange perfume used to be how cheating husbands got caught out.

But in these days of big divorce settlements, spurned partners are gathering evidence the hi-tech way.

One US firm has produced a SIM card reader that opens text messages AFTER they've been deleted - and that's just the tip of the iceberg.

Other surveillance gadgets used today would look at home in spy films.

They're legal and freely available from websites spystoreuk.com, spycatcheronline.co.uk and brickhousesecurity.com Here are a few of the best.

The trial of Kevin Underwood, accused of the gruesome murder of a young girl in Purcell took a strange twist last week in Cleveland County District Court as presiding Judge Candace Blalock accused a local TV station of hiring hackers to break into her computer and steal her e-mail.

Dallas-based Tenet Healthcare Corp. last week sent out notices to about 37,000 patients informing them about the potential compromise of their personal and financial data.

The warning came after Terrence Brooks, a former data processor at a Tenet bill processing center in Frisco, Texas, was arrested last month and subsequently pleaded guilty to five counts of fraudulent use and possession of identification information stolen from Tenet.

Hackers obtained credit card information and other personal data from several thousand customers who purchased books on Eslite's online bookstore after gaining unauthorized access to a third-party computer system, the company said yesterday.

"The computer system of various convenience stores in charge of delivering orders from Eslite's clients was hacked into last December," said Huang Hui-lin, deputy head officer at Eslite's Marketing and Planning Department.

Personal data of "at least 6,000 customers" were affected in December 2006 only, she said.

A soldier has had his personal laptop stolen while out for the night.

According to a source close to the incident, reports that the laptop contained the personal details of more than 200 soldiers, as well as the names of their wives and children, were exagerated.

Apparently, Royal Engineers Captain Luke Badger had his unencrypted personal laptop stolen while out for the night at the Troy club in London. While the laptop contained some details, there was nothing secret on it, according to the source.