So in the last couple of weeks, we’ve seen data breaches on the Sony PlayStation network, Sega’s online gaming network, Citigroup credit cards, and most recently, Dropbox.
Here’s my new proposed Terms Of Use agreement that such firms can use as a CYA in the future:
TERMS OF USE: You understand and agree that:
- Inevitably, this website will be compromised. I mean, sh** happens.
- We store much more of your confidential information than is really necessary, so when the inevitable compromise occurs, you’ll be f**ked eight ways from Sunday. But it won’t be our fault.
- When the media descends on us after a breach, we will loudly protest that we use “the strongest industry-standard security measures” and that we “monitor our site constantly”, all of which won’t matter because you’ll be f**ked eight ways from Sunday.
- We will quickly wring our collective hands and apologize that “this should never have happened”, that we “are investigating the incident vigorously”, and/or that we “will notify customers whose accounts appear to have been accessed improperly” (how we would actually know which ones, given that our site was compromised, will remain unclear). In any case, though, what it will boil down to is: you’re f**ked eight ways from Sunday.
- If you have half a brain, you are already doing end-to-end encryption on stuff you care about (for example, as 1Password does when backing up your secret passwords database to Dropbox).
- We will encourage you to check the “remember this credit card for Romanian hackers^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H future purchases” checkbox, but you probably shouldn’t.
