The intern responsible for the Ohio State Data Breach has come forward to make a statement. As previously reported, the intern left a computer back-up tape containing employee names and Social Security numbers in his car, which was subsequently robbed.

The intern, who took the back-up tape home has been made a scapegoat, receiving blame for not taking adequate steps to safeguard the information.

The intern, Jared Ilovar, was fired after refusing to resign from his post. In an email to the press, Ilovar says he was made a scapegoat and that his car was one of five broken into at his apartment complex.

“I was a victim of a random car theft, and now I am the scapegoat for the state of Ohio,” he wrote in the e-mail. “On the subject of instructions, I was never instructed by my employer on how to properly secure, store or watch over the data tapes at night. … I was the newest person in the door, so I inherited the job of taking the data tapes out of the building. That was the extent of my instructions.”

Read more on the Ohio situation here:

• Ohio State Data Theft
• Absolute Software to protect Ohio laptops

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