Case Study of Lost CDs Containing UK Child Benefits Data

30 November 2007

CASE STUDY OBJECTIVES

Identify and analyze UK legislation and legal statutes that required Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs (HMRC) to send data to the National Audit Office (NAO).
Define and calculate a model to assess the cost of removing personal data from the CDs.
- This action was requested by NAO but not performed by HMRC due to cost.
- A news article has estimated the cost to be about £5000, but did not provide the model used to calculate that value.
Define and calculate a model to assess the cost of sending letters of apology to all the families affected by the lost CDs.
- A news article has indicated that some MPs are trying to make an issue of the postage cost. The article also suggested that some letters of apology may contain incorrect personal details.
- Full text of the letter sent to affected families.
Define and calculate a model to assess the resources and time required to crack the two passwords used to protect data on the CDs.
- Identify specific tools and provide specific examples of password attacks.
Provide several specific recommendations for individuals and small businesses to protect data.
- 2 products for protecting data.
- 2 best practices for protecting data.
- 2 best practices for using passwords.

The department would like to promote the completed case study to news organizations.

EFFECTS ON COURSEWORK

All students would work together on the case study and receive the same mark.
The case study would be a replacement for Article 4 of the unit coursework.
The same marking criteria would be applied to the case study as the other coursework articles.
The coursework will be submitted using the Mosaic website.

USEFUL RESOURCES