Singapore HIV Registry Data Leaked Online in Health Breach (bbc.com) 61
Confidential data about more than 14,000 people diagnosed with HIV, including foreign visitors, has been stolen in Singapore and leaked online. From a report: Authorities revealed details about the 2016 health data breach on Monday. They believe an HIV-positive American whose partner was a senior Singaporean doctor is behind the leak. The hack comes just months after the records of 1.5m Singaporeans, including Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, were stolen last year. Confidential information including names, addresses, HIV status and other medical information is reportedly included in the latest breach. Officials say the details of 5,400 Singaporeans and 8,800 foreigners dating up to January 2013 have been compromised.
Re:This data SHOULD be public. (Score:4, Insightful)
AND in the usa risk them getting black listed form (Score:4, Informative)
AND in the usa risk them getting black listed form any health care.
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AND in the usa risk them getting black listed form any health care.
Healthcare? We have Healthcare in the US?
I thought we just had Walletcare*
*As in how can I drain your wallet today?
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Iâ(TM)m straight and in a monogamous relationship. I still get tested once per year.
It sounds like you have trust issues :D
About 30 (sheesh that long!) years ago when I was dating I had an HIV test just as part of normal dating life - not that I was doing anything weird or risky, just being precautions and paranoid. When work wanted to get me a health insurance for some extended overseas trips one of the questions was have you ever had an HIV test. After that word came down to me via HR that the insurance company wanted an explanation as to why I had had an HIV test. I had to explain to
Re: This data SHOULD be public. (Score:2)
Everyone involved in that story sound like grade-A arseholes, including yourself.
You, clearly, are always looking for assholes.
Clench those sphincters, folks; this one's looking for a tight space to squeeze into...
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Btw, when insurance starts asking questions like "have you ever been tested" it is a huge red flag that they have over stepped any legitimate risk assessment and are just taking the piss. Next time tell 'em to get fucked - you end up travelling without insurance, so what, you'll be more of a human being for it.
The original poster's name Ozpeter implies an Australian but the incident was 30 years ago. These days I suspect it may be unlawful to ask the question due to discrimination laws, but your suggestion that someone should travel without copious medical travel insurance, including full medical repatriation if needed, is just insane.
You're likely to find yourself in a bed in some Asian or American shithole hospital with a half-million dollar medical bill and no way to get home. I'm not sure about the US but so
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Clearly you've never been to Singapore.
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How about having them wear some mark on their clothing so we can better identify them?
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They should have done that in the 1980s. HIV would be dead now. but only if they forced a tattoo as well.
Please tell me about your magical technology that could diagnose HIV in a timely manner. I'm sure the medical industry has totally been ignoring you.
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There's a couple of problems associated with this.
First of all, it was initially considered a "gay pest". So a lot of people had zero problem with the problem just spreading, hoping that it would only kill the fags. Yes, including the dimwit politicians in power back then. Only very, very slowly it dawned on them that the scientists examining the virus ain't all liberal gay lovers but do actually warn of a real threat for everyone around (why, you thought people were smarter in the 80s?). So if you want to
You know, the Nazis had pieces of flair that they (Score:2)
You know, the Nazis had pieces of flair that they made the Jews wear.
So you want to put people with HIV in a death camp?
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You don't say, gee, why didn't I think of this when making this comment?
Re:This data SHOULD be public. (Score:5, Insightful)
It's well known that gays will lie about their HIV status.
As such, all who are HIV-positive should be on a list which can be accessed by anyone.
OK .. I'll run with this. Are we listing people with infectious disease that can kill? or just infectious diseases? or are we just listing STDs that can kill? Or just STDs that can't be cured? Or even just STDs? Would you want any of all of those conditions listed for you own health status to be publicly available? For instance, if you have ever had a cold sore, you technically are at risk for passing it as an STD as HSV-1 will happily live in the genital region and cause all sorts of fun and games.
And how are you going to securely tie a person you want to jump into bed with, with a collection of records in a DB somewhere? Oh, you looked up Fred A. Nurk, and you say he's HIV positive? Well I'm Fred B. Nurk .. totally safe .. now lets get at it!
It seems like your solution is going to involve back tattoos and listing out human readable codes that indicate current health status. And we all know how it worked out the last time that people were tattooed for identification.
And BTW how do you even deal with people who have no idea they are HIV positive and have never been tested?
And why are you singling out gays? HIV is not a "gay" disease.
Absolute power corrupts absolutely (Score:2, Insightful)
This is an excellent response and a great example of why governments should have the bare minimum of power and authority to protect life, liberty, and property.
Most people that advocate for larger and more powerful government seem unable to think two steps ahead as to how that power and authority can be misused.
Government should be given authority to solve a problem ONLY after all other reasonable attempts at solving the problem have failed.
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And a supermajority believes government should be granted that new power.
The fundamental relationship between power and the people should be something most agree with.
Re:This data SHOULD be public. (Score:4, Informative)
It's well known that gays will lie about their HIV status. As such, all who are HIV-positive should be on a list which can be accessed by anyone.
And BTW how do you even deal with people who have no idea they are HIV positive and have never been tested?
A bigger problem than the anonymous coward you quoted seems to be aware of. Someone who doesn't know they are HIV+ you cannot be treated. Most people who are are aware of their HIV+ status and treated eventually become undetectable, and the consensus is that undetectable is effectively untransmittable [cdc.gov] (see: "people who take ART daily as prescribed and achieve and maintain an undetectable viral load have effectively no risk of sexually transmitting the virus to an HIV-negative partner").
The risk is much greater from someone who says they're "negative" but only because they've never been tested. As bad of an idea as the poster's "list" would be anyway, it has no chance of helping here, where the greater danger lies.
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The list is likely of individuals that are in all likelihood undetectable. As you cite, the great danger is the person that doesn't get tested, or worse, showing no symptoms, doesn't care.
Drug users are rarer in Singapore, but it's a place that's highly transient in nature, and sex-work and LGBTQ+ activities are driven more underground than in other places.
All this said, shaming individuals with HIV is plainly wrong.
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Personally I think the AC was/is (dare I say it?) butt-hurt about something to do with gays and was merely trolling (and has no idea of the real world or even cares about it). Normally I wouldn't reply to such a comment but today was his/her lucky day.
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You don't have to have had a cold sore. 50%+ of the adult population harbours herpes simplex viruses. They're endemic.
Does Epstein-Barr virus (the cause of mono, the kissing disease) count as an STD? Something like 90%+ of the population has it.
Free tattoos for everybody!
Computerized Medical Records (Score:1, Troll)
Data wants to be free. Everyone should assume that digital medical records have a non-zero chance of getting out. If you don't want your medical records online, don't agree to digital medical records.
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Oh please, could you at least not shill in ONE thread?
Not that this thread was in any way important (wtf does this have to do with news for nerds?) but still, could you shill on Twitter like all the other assholes? Thanks.
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HIV these days is far from a death sentence - our modern HIV treatments are so effective that we've had to shut down HIV wards at hospitals because it's quite controllable
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Communicable diseases, especially incurable, lifelong and fatal ones (HIV) should be public knowledge!
If we don't have the temerity as a species/civilization to quarantine such individuals, at least let the public stay away from them on their own accord!
Sadly, there are far too many individuals who are terrified of such people. Lacking the capability to cope with their fear they then turn to violence and begin killing people. You can claim it's unrealistic but it's been proven time and time again that cowards inevitably do this.
Besides, if we're going to do this for communicable diseases like HIV, why not also have a list for all communicable diseases down to the specific mutation (not all variants are equal after all). We can all have a nice laugh as m
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Communicable diseases, especially incurable, lifelong and fatal ones (HIV) should be public knowledge!
I see on your public record you have type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, and genetic predisposition to prostate cancer. I think I will hire that other less qualified candidate that doesn't have life expectancy in low single digits.
Numbers (Score:1)
Out of 14,200.
Additional safeguards implemented (Score:1)
(13.) Since 2016, additional safeguards against mishandling of information by authorised staff have been put in place. For example, a two-person approval process to download and decrypt Registry information was implemented in September 2016, to ensure that the information cannot be accessed by a single person. A workstation specifically configured and locked down to prevent unauthorised information remo