Nasty development in medical privacy

[Ross Anderson]

An article at <http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/322/7284/442> tells
the story behind the recent prosecution of a man in Scotland for
knowingly infecting his partner with HIV.

In different studies, both the complainant and the defendant had
volunteered genetic samples that were supposed to be kept
anonymous. The police broke the anonymity and thus made the medical
researchers' undertaking of confidentiality worthless.

Yet another example of the limitations of `encrypting stuff' as a
solution to real world information protection problems

Ross