Those cds

I'm sure like other Brits with a technology streak to their career, I take the story of the two cds with 25million records of almost half the population of the UK that went missing last week as almost a personal slur. With all civil service agencies having broadband internet, why on earth would they want to send just over 1GB of data by cd anyway? In Nigeria, you are often constrained to use flash drives and cds just because of inadequate bandwidth, but in the UK, which has one of the most competitive ISP markets in the world? Haba.

If, for some silly antiquated bureaucratic reason, they have to send the data by physical means, why did they not at least encrypt it before burning onto the cd? Surely someone must have thought of the scenario of missing cd's? And surely, they do encrypt personal data in the public sector, don't they? The fact that you can buy someone's UK bank details online for US$75 from dodgy Russian syndicates shows how easy identity theft has become, without this generous helping hand from the UK's Customs office. As the home of one of the best project management methodologies going (PRINCE2), its shocking that the civil service in the UK clearly has such a hazy relationship to risk analysis and mitigation.

This story confirms the general impression that the British civil service has fallen way behind the pack on contemporary e-government best practice.

Worse still for Gordon Brown, it only helps to convey the impression that he has lost control - of the economy (witness the Northern Wreck assets scandal of earlier last week), and of the nation's data. With an inexperienced kitchen cabinet (Ed Miliband, Ed Balls, Alasdair Darling), he is looking ferociously exposed all of a sudden..