Via EPIC: “NASA has announced that the theft of an unencrypted laptop has compromised the personal information of a “large number” of NASA employees and contractors. A similar theft earlier this year exposed the data of thousands of Kennedy Space Center employees. The federal agency said that by the end of the year all NASA laptops must have full-disk encryption. The recent developments follow a 2010 United States Supreme Court case, NASA v. Nelson, in which a federal contractor challenged NASA’s overly broad collection of personal information. EPIC filed an amicus curiae brief in support of the contractor Robert Nelson, arguing that there were insufficient legal protections and that NASA’s systems are vulnerable to data breaches. Robert Nelson is among the employees and contractors who this week received a notice from NASA about the data breach. For more information, see EPIC: NASA v. Nelson and EPIC: Privacy Act.”