One of the justifications of the NSA's phone database program was that
traffic analysis wasn't much of an invasion
of privacy. The HP pretexting debacle shows just how bogus that is. By simple phone
records analysis it was possible to determine which HP board member
was leaking records to the press. And thanks to a somewhat confusing
legal climate and weak access controls, the phone records are
trivial to get.
That said, it's sort of surprising that the leaking board member (George Keyworth) didn't take more precautions to protect himself. It's not like it's difficult to get anonymous cell phones and e-mail accounts. Next time I leak corporate secrets I'll be sure to use one.
