Dept. of Ed laptops stolen

Oops, they did it again! Two laptop computers were stolen from the US Dept. of Education. This is the second time in less than a month, reports FCW.

A department contractor acknowledged the two laptop computers were stolen Aug. 11 from its Washington, D.C., office on K Street. The laptops contained information on 43 reviewers who were assessing grant applications said Bruce Rankin, vice president of DTI, the contractor working on the project.

“We were not working with this data,” he added. “It was part of the process of selecting readers’ unique identifiers. We have no other personal data from these folks,” said Rankin.

There was some personal data regarding payroll, but all of those affected have been given identity theft protection information from the Federal Trade Commission.

The Washington, D.C., Metropolitan Police Department has a video surveillance tape that appears to show the person who stole the units, he added.

Last week a student loan page on the department’s Web site malfunctioned and about 21,000 borrowers who had logged on to the page may have inadvertently exposed their personal data, including phone numbers, addresses and Social Security numbers, to others on the site.