RSSVerizon admits Obama's cell records were violated
By Tim Conneally | Published November 21, 2008, 11:11 AM
Yesterday, Verizon Wireless issued a statement that "a number" of its employees accessed US President-Elect Barack Obama's personal cell phone account without authorization.
"The account has been inactive for several months. The device on the account was a simple voice flip-phone, not a BlackBerry or other smartphone designed for e-mail or other data services," Verizon Wireless President and CEO Lowell McAdam said, "All employees who have accessed the account -- whether authorized or not -- have been put on immediate leave, with pay. As the circumstances of each individual employee's access to the account are determined, the company will take appropriate actions. Employees with legitimate business needs for access will be returned to their positions, while employees who have accessed the account improperly and without legitimate business justification will face appropriate disciplinary action."
The company does not detail the exact number of employees who illicitly viewed the President-Elect's account information, nor does it forecast how many times his number may have been distributed.
"We apologize to President-Elect Obama and will work to keep the trust our customers place in us every day," said McAdam.
5:50 pm EST November 21, 2008 - This afternoon, CNN reported that employees from Verizon Wireless were fired today, for having breached Pres.-Elect Obama's private phone records. The exact number of employees was not given, though a VZW spokesperson told the network that no text messages could have been read through the limited information the employees accessed.
That's ridiculous. Only the people with the right credentials should have access to VIP accounts, most of all the President's. Verizon really needs to review who can access what.
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Every account should have an unforgettable code
that is on the ESN sticker. This way no agent
can pull up the account without the proper credentials. Only a manger.
This would limit $1 an hour employees from foreign nations snooping on our privacy.
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what a s***ty way to loose one's job ...
and if they face criminal charges, they're going to get ****ed... big time
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And having the President of the United States upset at them? Boy, they are *stupid*.
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Then their attorneys will ask Obama for a pardon in 4 years. Only kidding of course, but since 2001 Americans privacy has been dwindling by the day. When and where does it stop?
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This is unacceptable, no low level employee should have access to anyone's accounts. Especially Obama's. This is disturbing, our privacy is being violated.
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That depends on who accessed the account. If it were customer service or business service reps then they can pretty much access any account. Every time they do, though, it is logged in the system with who accessed the account, when, and what they did. If changes were made that raises flags. I'm betting someone changed something on Obama's account so a flag was raised.
Healthcare in terms of records and lab work, works the same way. Even celebrity accounts in banks are similiar. And those types are monitored VERY closely.
Thats probably how they found out employees have accesssed the account.
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What world so you live in?? I know people that work for Sprint and they openly sell phone records to PI's...
I'm really surpised Verizon disclosed it.
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How else are you going to service an account? Granted, some accounts are flagged as VIP accounts and require special handling, (as Obama's should have been) but even then, most people in a call center or anyone that needs to update an account would have access.
A friend of mine that used to work for DirectTV in a call center, years ago before all this privacy mess (not that privacy wasn't important, it just wasn't in the forefront as it is now). My friend talked about how in thier downtime, they would look up the pay-per-view accounts of differnt stars and see what they where watching, such as how many pr0n and such some stars would pay for.
Not something you would be able to get away with in the current day and age.
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Ouch.. Obama's not on the board of Apple?? Like alot of the other democrats??
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