By Clicking the US Search Site Google, Names and Addresses Are Flowing Out

It was confirmed on the 23rd that at the most used internet search site in the world `Google` of America, personal data of Koreans, including public officers and college professors, had been spreading indiscriminately.

Especially, among those Korea related data, there were `confidential` personal data, which were managed by governments and public offices included, so it exposed a big hole in the national information management system.

In this search site, hundreds of thousands of personal data of △public officers and college professors, △users of shopping malls and cable TV, and △users of paid internet sites, such as responsibilities or assignments, resident registration numbers, addresses, cell phone numbers, passwords, and temporary number for lost passwords, are being exposed.

However, the corresponding offices, businesses and individuals do not even know the fact. `Google,` which started to service since 1998, is a search site that anyone can log on from anywhere in the world and 100 million people use it a day.

▽The Reality=At `Google,` 43 document files, which contains names, positions, rankings, education levels, and even resident registration numbers of the 2,075 public officers of 23 city and county offices in Gyongbuk, have been posted for more than 6 months.

It is posted like, `Pohang City, General Affairs Section, Deputy Local Administrator, 9th Level, Hong, 00, 670xxx-, College Graduate, Male.`

The `internal document` of the Cholla Nam and Buk-Do, which contains names in Chinese characters, hire dates, resident registration numbers of public officers and the local community heads, is exposed, and the list of the members of the steering committee of a school in Chungju, Chungbuk shows names in Chinese characters, resident registration numbers, cell phone numbers, and numbers of their apartments.

Not only public officers but also personal data of colleges and business are exposed. In the data of many colleges in Seoul, Busan, and Jonju, personal data of applicants for the new professor positions are exposed, and one can easily see resumes of college professors who participate on the Brain Korea 21 Project. Those resumes are `internal document` that contains not only resident registration numbers but also family information.

The situation is even worse like a document marked `confidential` by a school uniform manufacturer in Seoul, which has bidding techniques and bidding price calculation method, is exposed.

The outflow of user information of cable TV, shopping malls, and paid Internet sites is even more serious. The list of users, which predicted to be tens of thousands, contains ID and passwords and temporary numbers for lost passwords as well as resident registration numbers, so there is a big chance for these data to be used for crimes on credit.

▽Cause and counter plan=It is assumed that the documents were slipped through while public offices, colleges, and businesses sending them through internet and not be careful about security. Although they have to set the reading authority after making a document, they are neglecting it. There also is a chance for data to be drained by hacking.

The computer experts pointed out, “The computer security managers make `back doors` to manage documents from outside for their own convenience, so the strong search engine of `Google` might go through it.”

The Chair of the Data Protection Committee, Jung, Tae-Myong (Professor, Computer Science Department, Songgyunguan University) pointed out, “The problem is although this is a serious problem, problem awareness of public offices including the Government is too low.”

boriam@donga.com