The Police and their Minister, Stuart Nash, are busily lying like flatfish over the data breach that saw more than 37,000 licensed firearms owners’ private details left open to anyone visiting a Police administered website.
Police have confirmed a dealer with legitimate access to the online notification platform for the gun buyback programme was able to see all owners’ details.
Police Deputy Commissioner Mike Clement said they were notified this morning by the dealer.
An update to the database – not authorised by police – had given dealers a higher level of access last week thanks to “human error”, police said.
Only one dealer appeared to have used that access.
The vendor for the online notification platform was SAP, a German based global software company.
Gun buybacks are continuing using a manual process while the platform is offline. It will remain offline until SAP can ensure police the system is secure.
None of that is actually true. The BFD is aware of more than 50 people contacting lawyers and arms industry groups who were able to access the data.
Worse, it wasn’t just dealers, it was anyone, and we are aware that one prominent lawyer plus COLFO have documented the access without being a dealer, thus refuting the claim of both Police and Stuart Nash.
A manual process won’t work either, as you are required to have notified Police via this website and obtained a number that can be verified. The system is now broken and the sooner the Police and Nash admit their screw up, the better. It seems, however, that they have taken the blame route rather than accepting responsibility.
Both the minister and the clown in charge are busily threatening people.
Clement said if that was true police would find out as the investigation continued and be in touch with those people to ensure the information was secure and had not been shared.
Anyone who was circulating the private information of people in the system would be committing an offence, he said.
There was no hack involved in the information being made available, Clement said.
He was confident no-one in the NZ Police was at fault.
That is a rather bold claim for Mike Clement to make, one he is likely to regret. He makes even bolder statements:
Based on the information he had, firearm holders did not need to take any special measures to ensure they were safe, Clement said.
If that changed those people would quickly be contacted, he said.
Clement said he was confident firearms owners remained confident with police processes, though they would be “disappointed” as he was in what had happened today.
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Confident that firearms owners remain confident in the Police? Surely he jests? Mike Clement should buy a clown suit and a unicycle after making ludicrous claims like that.
I’d like to see this clown outfit even begin to try to communicate urgently with more than 37,000 people who have just been taught that the Police can’t even keep important firearms data safe – nor can those people rely upon this same crew of fools to protect them.
I don’t think Stuart Nash yet realises that the Police have set him up for the fall. In one fell swoop today, the Police have utterly destroyed the last vestige of trust anyone in the firearms community had left. Nash has presided over that by ignoring sensible advice and ramming through a Police wish-list that has now exploded in his face.
Their incompetence has put more than 37,000 gun owners at severe risk from criminals who now potentially have a shopping list.
I can foresee a massive class-action lawsuit against the Police, and no amount of victim-blaming is going to get them off the hook.
When the Prime Minister finds out that Stuart Nash has misled her and the country, I don’t think even mass sackings of senior Police will save his neck from the same chopping block.
After this, any politician who pushes for a gun register is likewise going to find themselves in the political firing line with their career in parliament at risk.
Firearms owners have now run out of patience. Labour has only been calculating damage by votes, but they have failed to understand that gun owners have money, lots of it, and the government, Police and Stuart Nash have pretty much ensured that we will now see brutal NRA-style third-party election campaigns manifest themselves during the election.
