USB follow \'nuclear power station stress assessment\' lost

A USB stick that contained details of a stress test at Hartlepool's nuclear power station was lost by a central authority inspector.

According to the Hartlepool Mail, management on the nuclear power station said the data was nothing greater than technical data which were publicly available for weeks. The Daily Mail reported that the govt. official was an employee of the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR), portion of the Health and Safety Executive (HSE).

An ONR spokesperson said: “At the beginning of the eu Commission ‘stress test' programme, the licensees of all UK nuclear power stations committed to publishing their stress test reports, so many of the findings during this report are actually within the public domain. The usage of unencrypted USB pen drives isn't permitted by ONR for transporting documents with a safety classification. An internal investigation was undertaken by ONR.'

Terry Greer-King, UK MD at Check Point, said: “This simply highlights the hazards that companies expose themselves to when using unencrypted devices. In November 2011, we surveyed 320 UK private and non-private sector firms, and 50 per cent of them weren't encrypting data on USB sticks despite the high-profile security breaches of contemporary years. So these events tend to carry on occurring.”