It now seems clear that the massive data breach at Equifax was caused not simply by aggressive hackers but by clear and potentially negligent security errors by Equifax itself. But fundamentally, this isn’t a security problem. It’s a market failure and a legal and regulatory failure.
There are many businesses in which the cost and assumed liability of taking possession of certain goods – real or intellectual – is quite high. Indeed, that is often a major part of the business model itself – they are paid to take on that liability. Some extreme examples are transporting dangerous or volatile chemicals. This may be the biggest personal data security breach yet. But breaches that are nonetheless quite large happen basically all the time and the costs to the company are usually negligible. Yes, there’s a big PR hit and there’s usually some fine. But the costs in fraud and disruption in the lives of affected consumers totally dwarfs the financial cost to the company. On the most basic measure, the costs are not great enough to prevent companies like Equifax from making really basic mistakes like failing to install new security patches in a timely manner. It’s a cost of doing business. Read More
It hasn’t been the best 24 hours for Harvard University. You’ve probably heard that Harvard managed to piss almost everyone off by first extending and then rescinding a fellowship appointment to Chelsea Manning. But you may or may not have seen this article in the Times about a woman named Michelle Jones.
It is a fascinating and powerful story on many levels. Jones, now 45, just finished a 20 year stint in prison for killing her 4-year old son. It’s not entirely clear to me from the story – and I sense it was never entirely clear – whether Jones intentionally killed her son in a discreet act of violence or whether he died from some combination of physical beatings and neglect. Regardless, the ghastliness of the crime is not in dispute. Jones was originally sentenced to 50 years in prison and was released after 20 years for good behavior. Read More
The backstory here to these bizarre injuries being suffered by US diplomats in Cuba is fascinating. I’ve been baffled by the whole thing. Really a must read.
Tierney Sneed reports from the federal courthouse in Washington where Paul Manafort’s spokesperson just emerged from testifying before the Mueller grand jury.
On Air Force One a short time ago, President Trump doubled down on his ‘many sides’ talk about Charlottesville. The exchange was specifically about Trump’s meeting yesterday with Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, the only African-American Republican in Senate. Read More
This may go without saying for some. But I do not think that Democrats are giving Trump some help or throwing him a lifeline at the price of accomplishing something really critical in policy terms – protecting the Dreamers. I think that gets this exactly wrong. I think pressing Trump for this deal is doing immense damage to Trump. Indeed, the more successful it is, the greater the damage. Read More
The word this morning is that leaders Pelosi and Schumer say Trump agreed to make DACA law as part of a deal that upped funding for “border security” but not for a wall. But Trump came out and said there’s no deal. So it’s all a mess and a big dispute.
I think if you look closely, that’s not quite what happened. Read More
Both Rep. Pelosi and Senator Schumer and, separately, the White House have released statements on this evening’s dinner at the White House. Note the references to DACA and the non-references to the wall. Read More