FastCompany.com is reporting that the biometric data of almost every Israeli citizen has been compromised and is now available on the Internet. According to FastCompany.com:

"Authorities in the Middle Eastern country announced the arrest on Monday of a suspect responsible for the massive data theft. He's a contract worker at the Israeli Welfare Ministry who was allegedly engaged in small-scale white collar crimes after-hours and who is accused of stealing Israel's primary national biometric database in 2006. He had access to the database, which is part of the country's population registry, through his office."

The FastCompany.com article went on to say that "[T]he stolen database contained the name, date of birth, national identification number, and family members of 9 million Israelis, living and dead. More alarmingly, the database contained information on the birth parents of hundreds of thousands of adopted Israelis--including children--and detailed health information on individual citizens."

Clearly, as more governments, such as India and Germany, collect more biometric data on their citizens, the security of such information will continue to be an issue. For corporate America, this breach underscores the need to keep security at the forefront as you collect and use more and more personal information for customers and employees.

You can read the FastCompany.com article by clicking here.