Inland Revenue Online Shares Personal Tax Information with Other Users

The Inland Revenue is looking for the glitch that allowed users to see details of others' online tax returns, having closed the site amid a crisis of confidence last week.

Users filing self-assessment tax returns over the internet were able to see confidential information on other taxpayers. The service was being used by about 75 000 people.

In May, the Government proposed a system of fines for companies and individuals who failed to file online by 2010 and the service had been subject of a major advertising campaign. But now the scaleability of the service is being questioned and commentators are observing that the breach of security has implications for people's trust in all kinds of public sector site.

It is one of the additions in the 2002 version of the service - a facility for users to check previous tax returns through secure e-mail inboxes on the Government Gateway - that has been the site of the trouble. Until the design of the Gateway is ruled out as the source of the problem, there is no way of knowing the extent of potential confidentiality breaches.

Online poker company uses Science to assess Player Preferences
Source: Recentpoker.com, 8 January 2009
 
Working with customer experience consultancy Foviance, PKR is exploiting the benefits of electroencephalography (EEG) technology to gather information on poker players' emotional relationship with a brand or service.

Do Users really love Laptops?
Source: channelinsider, 7 January 2009
 
More than one-fifth of all laptop computers will break down over the course of their life, and other limitations frustrate their users. From this list of user complaints come laptop opportunities.

User Interviews - Analysis Simplified
Source: Webcredible, 6 January 2009
 
You’ve conducted your user interviews, but now you need to make sense of all that information you’ve gathered.

Why Products Fail
Source: ComputerWorld, 5 January 2009
 
Most gadget and software makers don't understand what users want most: control.

How to Design Websites for Mobile Phones
Source: stemkoski.com, 3 January 2009
 
Tips from Ryan Stemkoski's web design blog.

Pioneer of Cyberspace honoured
Source: BBC, 2 January 2009
 
A professor who invented a forerunner of the world wide web has been made a dame in the New Year Honours.

2008 in Review: Developments that rocked the world of User Experience
Source: Catalyst Resources, 1 January 2009
 
A look back at 2008 highlights some of the key developments that rocked the world of user experience.

2008: The Year Online
Source: MIT Technology Review, 31 December 2008
 
The business of social networking, cloud computing, and a flaw in the fabric of the Internet top the most notable stories of 2008.

Shoveling through the Spamalanche
Source: UN, 30 December 2008
 
A ‘Spamalanche’ of 3,000 emails will be waiting in your inbox by the time you get back to work. What can you do besides 'delete all'?

New guidelines boost Web Access
Source: BBC, 29 December 2008
 
The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) has announced a new standard to make sites more accessible to older and disabled people.