Court rejects lawsuit seeking damages, suspension of My Number system

In June, a government committee on personal information protection announced there were 279 cases of My Number information being leaked including ID numbers at 134 institutions.

Ad there you have it, Japan has no privacy projection.

The state argued that even before the launch of the system, the state had handled such personal information, and that the cases of information leakage were a result of human error, rather than a defect in the system.

Funny, the system didnt create itself, and prior to the launch the government often mishandled private information anyway, so this should not be a valid defense of the system!

The problem is not ‘My Number’. The problem is the idiots managing the highly sensitive private data. It’s probably all stored on a Windows 7 server. High tech society my butt!

Presiding Judge Tsuyoshi Momosaki ruled there are no legal or systematic faults with the My Number system

That's reassuring.

and added, "It cannot be said that there is a risk of personal information being used outside proper administrative purposes."

No risk. Great.

cases of information leakage were a result of human error, rather than a defect in the system

That's...not very reassuring?

So it...can be said there is a risk of personal information being used outside proper administrative purposes.

"The people you entrust your data with may screw up and leak your data...but fear not!--There's no systematic defect, so there's no risk!"

But why is “My Number” a requirement for banking transactions?

But why is “My Number” a requirement for banking transactions?

One of the biggest reasons the "My Number" scheme was started was due people hiding taxable income from the government and people here have been sending money abroad to hide it from taxes.

What could possibly go wrong when the gov't offices still use Windows XP and Microsoft 2003 OS servers?

@Kyushubill:

Using old systems is great because nobody knows how to hack them anymore.