Legal Commentary

Deborah McReynolds, senior paralegal at St. Louis' Husch Blackwell Sanders, forwards a very unnerving CBS report about how copiers are being resold -- without wiping (aka "scrubbing") the hard drive.

CBS bought (for about $300 each) four machines from a warehouse and found hard drives that contained -- to put it mildly -- highly sensitive data. The first one had paper documents from the City of Buffalo's police department sex crimes division right in the copying tray, and the hard drive was loaded with detailed domestic violence reports. A second machine had a list of targets from the Buffalo PD for a drug raid.

A third machine had detailed documents about a construction project near Manhattan's ground zero, including copies of checks, building plans, and lots of Social Security numbers. The fourth machine had detailed, acutely private medical records from a health organization, including cancer diagnoses.

CBS' investigative team was able to retrieve the information on the hard drive using free forensics software available on the internet.

See also: CBS: "Copiers: Gold Mines for Identity Theft"; and CBS: "Digital Copiers Loaded with Secrets."