Press release
September 15, 2000
Shipley, Rankin letters on used PCs
An investigation by information technology weekly Computerworld has uncovered sensitive government and commercial
documents on PCs bought from a second-hand dealer.
Correspondence in the name of then prime minister Jenny Shipley and WINZ chief executive designate Christine Rankin are
among the documents from two PCs which appear to have originated at a government agency. Another PC, which was
apparently owned by a well-known finance company, contains letters to mortgage holders behind in their repayments.
Computerworld set out to show the unreliability of standard methods of wiping data from computer hard drives before
their disposal. It commissioned Auckland company Computer Forensics NZ Ltd. to analyse drives of second-hand PCs bought
at random.
"The people who disposed of these PCs should be very embarrassed, " said Computerworld editor Anthony Doesburg. "If they
made any attempt at all to delete the data on these PCs, they failed."
Computer Forensics managing director Brian Eardley-Wilmot said the investigation was a wake-up call to computer
administrators who thought reformatting a hard disk or dragging files to the trash was all it took to delete data. Files
must be over-written to destroy them, he said.
"IT managers are generally meticulous about internal security procedures," he said. But the work his firm carried out
for Computerworld demonstrated "appalling carelessness", which he believed to be common.
What the files said
The files found by Computer Forensics included the following material:
>From a letter by WINZ chief executive designate Christine Rankin to staff on organisational and benefit changes: " I
can guarantee that there will be lots of change from 1 October onwards ... As the saying goes, ‘Rome wasn’t built in a
day’, and much of the finer detail is still to be worked out ..."
>From a 1998 letter by Prime Minister Jenny Shipley replying to a query about employment and expressing sympathy
about the untimely death of a young man: "It is clear that the longer job seekers are out of work the higher the risk
that they will lose their motivation, self-esteem and
connection with the community, with the sad result that a number of job seekers get to the point of giving up ..."
Among correspondence on internal financial matters were several letters to customers of Avco Finance: 'I am extremely
disappointed that you have not kept your arrangements to pay your account ..."If you fail to comply, Avco intends to
pursue this
matter through other agencies ..." "We will no longer tolerate your inaction ..."
Further details
Computerworld's investigation is detailed in its September 18 issue. For more information contact:
Computerworld editor Anthony Doesburg, ph 0-9-302 8763 Computer Forensics NZ Ltd. managing director Brian
Eardley-Wilmot, ph 0-9-359 9424