2007-10-07 New Addresses on eDiscovery Avenue

In an article entitled "Securing Very Important Data - Your Own" appearing in the October 7, 2007 online edition of New York Times, the author gushes that users are "loving" to send out (the term "relinguishing" used in the article is telling) their personal, financial, credit card, telephone, social security, and other identity-specific data to service providers in exchange for financial management services. Notably, an offering called "Basecamp," described as a "powerful project management and collaboration tool" to store including "performance targets, to-do lists, files, collaborative documents, and messages" is alleged to claim more than one million users. Mint.com is another offering, described as having a "Swiss Army knife approach to personal financial management." In exchange for offering what appears to be every last drop of user information it can extract, Mint will offer users "specialized services" --- that will, on a nightly basis, connect to and update bank accounts, balance checkbooks, and even "shop" for better offering terms and rates on credit cards and other financial accounts.

Maybe these services are good, maybe not. Perhaps they are secure. Perhaps not. What they represent is a treasure trove of discoverable information.

Securing your very own data? Perhaps not.