University of Wisconsin Prof. Posts 196 Names and Grades Online
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: January 28, 2008Media Contact: Aaron Titus
(202) 669-2969
MADISON, Wisconsin. In late November, 2007 that Liberty Coalition discovered the names, scores, and Grades of 196 students of Professor Yu Hen Hu's ECE 734 classes between 1994 and 2006. The information was posted in Excel files on a University of Wisconsin - Madison server. According to the server, the files had been online for several years. Students affected by this breach are NOT at special risk of identity theft.
This breach fits within a common national pattern where university faculty or staff use university servers to store backed-up files, later forgetting them or assuming that they are not available to the public. Unfortunately in this instance, some of Professor Hu's backed-up files contained sensitive information which was made available online and was picked up by search engines.
Individuals affected by this exposure should immediately visit www.nationalidwatch.org and search for their names, to confirm what types of personal information were exposed. NationalIDWatch.org has a list of recommended steps victims should take.
About NationalIDWatch.org
National ID Watch is a search engine for personal information breaches. Sponsored by the Washington, DC non-profit Liberty Coalition, NationalIDWatch.org provides more than a million free personalized Identity Exposure Reports™ as a public service.
Each Identity Exposure Report (IXR) documents what types of personal information were exposed (such as Social Security Numbers, Birth Dates, Addresses, etc.), without revealing them. Each IXR also details the situation surrounding each exposure, and contact information of those responsible for the breach. Armed with this information, victims can further investigate, take action, or correct harm.