>>>>>>You can't imagine how this sort of thing can happen
>>>>>>
>>>>>>http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=495188&in_page_id=1770&ct=5
>>>>>
>>>>>? Things being lost in transit by couriers? I find that all too easy to imagine.
>>>>>
>>>>>I guess we'll find out how good the encryption was ...
>>>>>
>>>>>BTW Gordon Brown looks like "upper-class twit of the year" in that photo :-)
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>Reports are that if you can read English you've cracked the encryption.
>>>
>>>Really? Is there a follow-up article about that? Your original link just says it was "encrypted".
>>>
>>>It doesn't take much money or effort to have pretty good encryption these days. If the agency(s) involved couldn't be bothered it seems only fitting that heads should roll.
>>
>>This report says the data was unencrypted
>>
>>http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/11/20/ncustoms620.xml
>>
>>Doesn't sound to good if a junior employee had access to and the ability to make a copy of all this data anyway.
>
>I see the original article has been updated to remove the claim the data were encrypted (and the unflattering pic of Gordon Brown). Although, page 2 of the second article says the CDs were "password protected" (whatever that means).
>
>Clearly a serious scandal, with far-reaching consequences:
>
>"Shadow Chancellor George Osborne also suggested the fiasco marked the “final blow” for the government’s controversial National Identity Card scheme because: “They simply cannot be trusted with people’s personal information.”"
>
>My understanding is the NIC in the UK is a major Labour government undertaking, what we here in Canada would call a "confidence" issue. If the same thing had happened here our current minority government would have to abandon it, or likely fall to a non-confidence vote. Serious business.

Its a but wry when things like this become party political issues. The quality of staff and systems at HMRC (Revenue and Customs) has got very little to do with the government of the day.

I hope thay drop the NIC. I see it contributing almost nothing to national security and costing a great deal of money. Its not a popular measure but because the government has a very large majority I expect they could push it through if they wanted.