Privacy Breach In Canadian Passport Application Site 197
Joanna Karczmarek sends us news of a massive privacy breach in the Government of Canada passport website. "A security flaw in Passport Canada's website has allowed easy access to the personal information — including social insurance numbers, dates of birth and driver's license numbers — of people applying for new passports. ... The breach was discovered last week by an Ontario man completing his own passport application. He found he could easily view the applications of others by altering one character in the Internet address displayed by his Web browser."
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Wonderful (Score:3, Informative)
As for this security flaw, there was a similar one found a few months ago in the UK's own online visa applications system http://www.channel4.com/news/articles/business_money/online+visa+security+flaw/517157 [channel4.com] . Maybe they hired the same idiot programmers?
fixed AND old news. (Score:3, Informative)
Re:.aspx (Score:4, Informative)
Never, ever, trust data provided by the user. If there's potential to cause trouble, somebody will do it, which is why the site should have been keeping track of who's application was being filled out on the server, probably in a session variable.
Re:More fool them. (Score:2, Informative)
Re:25% of Canadians not born in Canada. (Score:5, Informative)
I work at a company with fifteen employees, representing eight distinct nationalities and we operate in perfect harmony. This place is not anomalous; I have lived through several similar situations at other companies.
However, I am also a sample of one. Let us look at statistics. Immigration accounted for two-thirds of Canada's population growth in 2006/2007 (http://www.statcan.ca/Daily/English/070927/d070927a.htm/ [statcan.ca]) and has always been a significant contributor to our population (http://www40.statcan.ca/l01/cst01/demo03.htm?sdi=population%20growth/ [statcan.ca]).
Does this trend pose difficulties? Certainly. However, were such a policy not embraced by the majority of Canadians, it certainly would not persist. The tolerance is real. Join us and see for yourself.
Re:Wow (Score:5, Informative)