Taxman's techie wipes key oil account data

AN ALASKAN Department of Revenue computer technician deleted key information for an oil-funded account and then made matters worse by wiping the backup drive.

The Revenue department had a back-up tapes but it turned out that these were completely unreadable. According to Associated Press, on the Sydney Morning Herald, the Department called in boffins from Microsoft and Dell to see if the the data could be saved, but it turned out that the techie had done a very good job at destroying everything.

Gone were 800,000 electronic copies of the 2006 paper applications that people had either mailed in or filed over the counter, and supporting documentation such as birth certificates and proof of residence.

In the end the department was saved by the fact that the original paperwork had been stored in 300 cardboard boxes after the contents had been laboriously scanned into the system last year.

The boxes contained nine months' worth of information concerning the yearly payout from the Alaska Permanent Fund. It was lucky that the boxes had not been chucked out, given the fact that no-one ever believed that a three-fold back-up could fail like that.

It has been estimated that the cock-up cost nearly $200,000 and a fair while to rescan everything. It is not clear if the department saved money by firing the techie. µ