Applus Technologies, Inc., a vendor of multiple state Departments of Motor Vehicles that assists states with vehicle inspections, recently announced that its systems have been affected by malware, disrupting motor vehicle inspections in Connecticut, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Massachusetts, New York, Texas, and Utah. As a result of the outage, vehicle inspections have not been able
Texas Drone Law Faces Constitutional Challenges
Texas’ drone law, the “Use of Unmanned Aircraft,” is being challenged by press organizations and photographers for alleged violations of the First Amendment. The law prohibits the capture of images of a person or property while conducting “surveillance.” It takes it a step further and makes it a crime to use the images captured…
Home Depot Settles Data Breach Multi-state Enforcement Action for $17.5 Million
Home Depot has agreed to settle a multi-state enforcement action by 46 U.S. states and Washington, D.C. arising from the data breach that occurred in 2014. Home Depot has agreed to pay $17.5 million to put the enforcement action behind it. The investigation was led by the Attorneys General of Connecticut, Illinois and Texas.
The…
Walmart’s COVID-19 Testing by Drone Pilot Program
If you live within a one and a half-mile radius of the east side of the Walmart store in El Paso, Texas in a single-family home, within a one-mile radius of the North Las Vegas Walmart store in a single-family home, or within a one-mile radius of the Cheektowaga, New York Walmart store, then you…
Tyler Technologies Victim of Cyber-Attack
As one of the largest information technology service providers to local governments, the cyber-attack on Tyler Technologies (Tyler) in Plano, Texas is a sobering reminder of how a cyber-attack on a third-party vendor can put government data at risk.
According to reports, Tyler may have been the victim of a ransomware attack that disrupted its…
Robots for Package and Food Delivery Invade the Sidewalks
A robot for the food delivery market first debuted at George Mason University in January 2019 from Starship Technologies (Starship). Starship did minimal marketing for these new robots for package and food delivery, but students found them, found the app, and then started requesting package and food delivery. It took off from there.
Now, more…
Texas Court System Hit with Ransomware
The Office of Court Administration in Texas (OCA) confirmed late last week that it is the victim of a ransomware attack. The OCA stated that it would not pay the ransom. “OCA was able to catch the ransomware and limit its impact, and will not pay any ransom…Work continues to bring all judicial resources and…
Privacy Tip #220 – Identity Theft Still in Top Three Frauds Reported to FTC
Three million fraud cases were reported to the FTC in 2018, and 444,602 of them involved identity theft. These reported cases (just think of how high the statistic would be if all cases were reported) amounts to the third most common type of fraud reported to the FTC.
According to The Motley Fool, of…
On the Border Restaurant Suffers Data Breach
Last week, the Tex-Mex restaurant chain On the Border suffered a data breach that impacted its payment acceptance systems in 27 states. The restaurant says that some credit card information of customers who visited the chain between April and August 2019 may have been compromised. In a press release, On the Border representatives said, “Our…
Dental Practice Pays $10,000 Fine to OCR for Disclosing PHI on Social Media
Elite Dental Associates (Elite), located in Dallas, Texas has agreed to settle alleged HIPAA violations with the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) for $10,000.
The OCR alleged that it received a complaint from a patient in June of 2016 that Elite had disclosed the patient’s last name and details of the patient’s health condition on…