Italian govt posts tax return information of ALL of its citizens

["Allan Friedman" <allan_friedman () ksgphd harvard edu>]

This was not actually a breach, since it was intentional! Still
relevant for dataloss, I think.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7376608.stm

There has been outrage in Italy after the outgoing government
published every Italian's declared earnings and tax contributions on
the internet.

The tax authority's website was inundated by people curious to know
how much their neighbours, celebrities or sports stars were making.

The Italian treasury suspended the website after a formal complaint
from the country's privacy watchdog.

The information was put on the site with no warning for nearly 24 hours.

...

The release of the information was one of the last acts of the
outgoing centre-left government and has shocked many tax-shy Italians,
says the BBC's Mark Duff in Milan.

But it was also hugely popular, and within hours the site was
overwhelmed and impossible to access.

The finance ministry described the move as a bid to improve transparency.

Deputy Economic Minister Vincenzo Visco said he could not understand
what all the fuss was about.

"I can't understand what the problem is," he is quoted as telling
Italy's Corriere della Sera newspaper.

"This already exists all around the world, you just have to watch any
American soap to see that. We had the system ready by January but we
delayed publication to avoid arguments during the election campaign."

But critics condemned it as an outrageous breach of privacy.
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