Scrounging through a Dump in Ghana

It's a funny world alright. The guvmint is so concerned about security and all, getting tight on borders, wanting to know everything on citizens, reading your emails and watching what you shop for.

How is it, then, that a group of journalism students find hard drives containing sensitive information in a dump in Ghana?

Somebody being careless?

Journalism students from the University of British Columbia discovered intact hard drives containing secret international security data and personal information at a digital dumping ground in Ghana, said their teacher, Peter Klein.

Mr. Klein, a producer for the PBS television program Frontline and an Emmy Award winning journalist, said the drives included information about U.S. Homeland Security and Pentagon defence contracts as well as social security numbers, credit card numbers, and family photos

www.theglobeandmail.com...

Ooops

One of the drives came from Northrop Grumman, a large U.S. military contractor. It contained “details about sensitive, multimillion-dollar U.S. government contracts” as well as contracts with the defence intelligence agency and NASA, according to a synopsis of the project on the PBS website.

Makes me wonder who needs watching more.

you would think they wouldve at least wiped them before disposing of them....

Even better question is, what the hell are hard drives doing with sensitive government information doing in Ghana?

Man the two biggest exports the US has is Debt and Garbage.

Don't you think we need a few people down there for 'research' now? might come back with some useful info.....

US computer companies pay people in third world countries to break up and dispose of old computers and terminals by hand, there have been an interesting series of stories on the health hazards of it. I thought those sites were across southern Asia, maybe they are doing it in Africa?