What a week!  We’ve had another hack using log in credentials stolen from another provider (see my Camelot breach blog), hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of fines issued by the ICO for millions of unsolicited calls and text, an ‘accidental’ Brexit strategy leak and people being exploited by cyber blackmail (now called Sextortion).

ICO fines and GSMA
This week Oracle Insurance was reported by consumers to the Global System Mobile Association’s (GSMA) SPAM reporting service, which the ICO accesses. After investigation the ICO found that Oracle had sent 136,369 marketing texts where sufficient consent hadn’t been given.  The ICO levied a fine of £30,000.

Similar to this Silver City Tech have been fined an explosive £100,000! The Dorset-based company denies sending any unsolicited texts, let alone 1,132,149 of them. A third party company sent the texts on behalf of Silver City Tech. However the ICO sees the third party as a postman just delivering the message – it’s the company behind the message (ie the data controller) that is held responsible. Again the company couldn’t provide any evidence of consent. After being approached by the ICO in Dec 2015 a further 1,942,182 texts were sent, resulting in Silvery City Tech being being fined £100,000.  There’s a clear message here -if the ICO investigates and advises you not to do something …. it’s as well to stop!

Reporting Spam
It’s worth knowing that if you want to report SPAM, just forward the text message to 7726 (spelling out SPAM).  Then you don’t need to text STOP back to the marketing company – which is always a risk as doing so validates your telephone number, and unscrupulous organisations may well then sell your number to another marketing company.

Brexit Strategy Leak
According to Sky News, the latest victim caught carrying an unguarded document in Downing Street is thought to be Julia Dockerill who works for Conservative Party vice-chairman (international) Mark Field.lady has been papped on her way to a cabinet meeting carrying a note pad detailing notes on the Brexit strategy. Now, personally I’m conflicted on this story. With all of the papping, data breaches, hacks and data-in-transit news stories that we all hear about on a daily basis, surely the victim must know that she needs to be safer than this?  Who doesn’t close their notepad after using it – especially outside Number 10? (Or is that me being fussy?)  There are arguments saying that this was planned and wasn’t an accident at all. What do you think?

Sextortion
If you’d asked me what sextortion was on Monday I would have looked at you blankly and thought you were speaking a different language. However on Wednesday the term was everywhere – on the radio, all over the BBC website and all over social media. If you haven’t heard about it, it’s organised criminal gangs enticing individuals (mainly young men) to perform sexual acts on a webcam.  The criminals then threaten to release the footage to their friends and family unless they pay them. Police say that the number of cases that the victims have been brave enough to report has over doubled from last year.. There are victims as young as 15 although statistics show that the majority of victims fall into the 18-21 age bracket, and there have been 4 suicides this year. Police are advising not to pay anything to blackmailers and contact the police immediately. The force has arrested 40 men responsible in the Philippines.

TalkTalk and Post Office Hack
Reports are coming in that TalkTalk and Post Office customer’s internet access has been cut after a number of routers were targeted. The Post Office have said that it has affected 100,000 of it’s customers and the problem started on Sunday. (A lot happened on Sunday, first the National Lottery, now the Post Office – is no one safe on a Sunday!?) Although it has affected a lot of people, we should thank our lucky stars we’re not in Germany where a similar hack affected an unlucky 900,000 customers.

I think we’ll all be thankful when this week ends. It just seems to be getting worse. However on a positive note it’s December now! Only 22 days until Christmas!!! (Not that I’m counting).

Written by Charlotte Seymour, 2nd December 2016