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Records Management in the News
The views represented in these articles do not necessarily represent the views of the editor, the Privacy Act Program, or the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. 
THE SCOOP for October 16, 2008
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10 Simple Tips to Stop Identity Theft
Times of the Internet - October 15, 2008
"People who commit identity theft make use of your private information for their own gain, or to sell it to others. Thieves can violate your privacy and make use of important information such as your date of birth, address, bank accounts, your credit card and in some cases, even your name." Auditors rap IRS for weak information security
NextGov - October 9, 2008
"The Internal Revenue Service has failed to secure sensitive electronic taxpayer information properly, increasing the potential for identity theft, according to an audit report released on Thursday."Data-Mining for Terrorists Not 'Feasible,' DHS-Funded Study Finds
Wired - October 7, 2008
"The government should not be building predictive data-mining programs systems that attempt to figure out who among millions is a terrorist, a privacy and terrorism commission funded by Homeland Security reported Tuesday. The commission found that the technology would not work and the inevitable mistakes would be un-American."Expanding The Records Management Universe
AIIM - October 10, 2008
"Today, records management and information management are coming together. As the e-discovery and content search needs grow within corporate organizations, there is an increasing realization that records management cannot be a siloed function unto itself."Feds propose consolidation of personal info in databases
CNET - October 8, 2008
"The federal government is trying to find better ways to standardize and coordinate personal information about American citizens that is currently spread across thousands of databases, according to a White House official."Govt. biometrics use still raises privacy concerns
CNET - October 8, 2008
"Is the idea of widespread biometric data collection still too spooky to win over the American public? At some level, it's already becoming commonplace: California and some other states demand fingerprints from driver's license holders. The Verified Identity Pass program includes iris scans, as does the U.K's border control system. And prisoners have their blood forcibly drawn for a DNA sample."GRC, Ediscovery, and RIM: Tools for Change
AIIM - October 14, 2008
"Governance, risk, and compliance (GRC); electronic discovery; and records and information management (RIM) are concepts familiar to all of you. The constructs are natural outgrowths of the information explosion brought forth by the computer revolution, but also the increasingly complex legal and regulatory environment which organizations must face."How Rule 502 Affects Lawyers and E-Discovery
LAW.COM - October 8, 2008
"On Sept. 19, 2008, President Bush signed into law a bill that, among other things, limits the circumstances under which the inadvertent disclosure of information protected by the attorney-client privilege or the work product doctrine will result in a waiver of those protections."The Law Requires Email Archiving
IT World - October 10, 2008
"After the amended Federal Rules of Civil Procedures were passed in December of 2006, all emails, communications, files, directives and requests that may be relevant to a current or future litigation cannot simply be deleted or overwritten. The data must be produced and thus it must be archived, because that's the law."On its way, at last - No longer a joke, the "paperless" office is getting closer
The Economist - October 9, 2008
"David Pineault, a paper expert at InfoTrends, a consultancy, estimates that office workers in rich countries will reduce their consumption of 'uncoated freesheet' paper (called 'woodfree' in Europe)—the sort used in offices—every year for the foreseeable future. Some market segments, such as high-quality paper for photo printing, may buck the trend. But overall, Mr Pineault is 'bearish' on paper."Providing Power When There is None
MarketWatch - October 9, 2008
"Imagine if electronic devices in the U.S. were disabled. Your car would not run. You couldn't make a phone call. Television, radio, GPS, computers and their related financial and military systems could be down. Power could be out for as long as two years."Security failures will happen; it's how you prepare that defines success
CIO - October 14, 2008
"With National Cyber-Security Awareness Month upon us, industry experts are abuzz about new and escalating threats facing today's security administrators, including a series of recently revealed statistics around cross site request forgery (CSRF) and Clickjacking attacks."
THE SCOOP for October 8, 2008
District Court Rules Against Secret Service in Judicial Watch's Lawsuit to Obtain Logs Detailing Jack Abramoff's White House Visits
MarketWatch - October 2, 2008
"The Court rejected the Secret Service's motion to dismiss the lawsuit and instead ordered the agency to finish processing Judicial Watch's open records requests and provide all non-exempt records within 20 days of the court order..."DoD biometrics: miles to go
Federal News Radio - October 3, 2008
"One of the hot buzzwords in national security circles these days is "biometrics": using fingerprints, or iris scans to verify that you are who you say you are. But a new Government Accountability Office study suggests that the Pentagon still has some work to do when it comes to agency-wide policies pertaining to biometrics."Experts debate how Congress can handle e-mail overflow
NextGov - October 2, 2008
"An avalanche of e-mails to Capitol Hill this week underscored the need for Congress to devote more money and resources to technologies, a communications expert warned Wednesday. The House's "Write Your Rep" application...was so overwhelmed as members battled over the $700 billion financial rescue plan that administrators had to impose limits on the Web-based program."Identity Management
NextGov - September 27, 2008
"One way to think about identity management is by imagining an enormous blueprint of an office building. It shows the rooms into which each person who works in the building can enter. The blueprint also shows what kind of key each person would need to open the door to get into that room, and what that person can do once they are there."IG: GSA must improve information security
NextGov - October 1, 2008
"The General Services Administration must improve its information technology security program to protect its sensitive information, according to an inspector general's report released this week."Planning in Advance for E-Discovery: It Costs Less in the End
Computer Technology Review - October 3, 2008
"IT analysts...have long advocated the cost and risk savings available by taking a proactive approach to e-discovery and using an archive with solid records management policies. However, despite numerous cost justification case studies, the adoption rate of this technology has been relatively slow."Shuttered EPA Libraries Reopen After Two-Year Battle, but Concerns Remain
Library Journal - September 30, 2008
"Five regional Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) libraries reopen today, two years after EPA officials began prematurely closing agency libraries in response to a proposed 80 percent funding cut by the Bush administration."Tech activist takes on governments over 'copyrighted' laws
CNET News - September 25, 2008
"Most geeks tend to be a bit obsessive, and Malamud is no exception. He's devoted his life to liberating laws, regulations, court cases, and the other myriad detritus that governments produce daily, but often lock up in proprietary databases or allow for-profit companies to sell for princely sums."Telecommuting Presents Privacy and Security Risks
Sci-Tech Today - October 1, 2008
"While many firms allow telecommuters to handle personal information at home, only half of survey respondents said they address this subject with formal policies and training. Indeed, the multidisciplinary nature of the topic -- is it human resources, information technology, security or privacy? -- make it difficult to determine whose responsibility it is.
THE SCOOP for October 1, 2008
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Consumer Reports Poll: Americans Extremely Concerned About Internet Privacy
MarketWatch - September 25, 2008
"According to the poll, 82 percent of consumers are concerned about their credit card numbers being stolen online, while 72 percent are concerned that their online behaviors were being tracked and profiled by companies." Court Orders Defendant to Re-Produce Documents Previously Produced as TIFF Images, Setting Out Three Format of Production Options
Electronic Discovery Law - September 24, 2008
"Plaintiff had initially failed to specify any desired format of production in its request for production to defendant. Because of such failure, defendant chose, of its own accord, to produce the requested documents "via TIFF images" rather than in their native format."Defense to re-engineer electronic health record system
NextGov - September 24, 2008
"The Defense Department has laid the groundwork for a radical shift in the way it processes and stores soldiers' and veterans' electronic health records, planning to re-engineer a network it spent $6 billion and eight years developing in-house for one based on industry standards, commercial software and re-use of existing code that will serve Defense and the Veterans Affairs Department, top officials told Nextgov."Grant program approved to preserve presidential documents
Government Executive - September 26, 2008
"The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Tuesday approved legislation that would establish a competitive grant program to help in the preservation of historical documents from past presidents."Internet service providers want to set industry guidelines for online privacy
Los Angeles Times - September 26, 2008
"Verizon, Time Warner Cable and AT & T executives, who testified this week before a Senate committee, say they want 'to go forward with this self-regulatory approach.'"Lost in the Fine Print: It Would Take a Week to Read All Your Privacy Policies
Washington Post - September 26, 2008
"It would take the average American about 42 hours -- an entire work week -- to read the online privacy policies for the Web-sites they encounter each year, according to new research being presented this weekend."Managing flood of White House records will tax NARA
NextGov - September 29, 2008
"The National Archives and Records Administration has established a workable plan to develop an information system to preserve electronic records, but the agency should consider a way to manage the possibility that it will not be able to process records from the Bush administration in time for the January 2009 transition, according to a Government Accountability Office report released on Friday."SBA Appeals Federal Court Ruling to Release Contracting Data
MarketWatch - September 25, 2008
"SBA lawyers told United States District Court Judge Marilyn H. Patel that the information requested by the ASBL was 'not an agency record.' Judge Patel disagreed and ruled against the SBA. In the court's summary judgment, Patel held that not only was the information requested by the ASBL an agency record, but the SBA was even responsible for compiling the data."Seeing the Future of Search in E-Discovery
LAW.COM - September 26, 2008
"[A] problem of search must be solved with information retrieval tools, and that requires the application of multiple expert competencies, including not only law and information technology, but also linguistics, statistics, computer science and subject matter expertise."Senate panel approves policies for release of sensitive documents
Government Executive - September 26, 2008
"The draft bill...would establish a Controlled Unclassified Information Office within the National Archives and Records Administration. The office would be responsible for developing and issuing polices and procedures 'governing the designation, safeguarding and dissemination of controlled unclassified information.'Tapping into Technology
Red Orbit - September 29, 2008
"Walk into any Veterans Health Administration facility in the nation as a patient, and the physician or pharmacist won't have to ask about your medical history. They'll already know it. It's all courtesy of the VA's Computer Patient Record System (CPRS), a 12-year-old electronic system of medical records that serves all 1,400 clinics and hospitals in the VA system."- Wall Street Bailout Will Reveal Information Management Gaps at Many Firms
AIIM - September 24, 2008
"This will be a challenging time for records and information management in the financial community. The holes in information management practices (and we all have them) are never more evident than when crisis strikes. Can we clearly document who knew what ... when ... and how did they know it?"