Starbucks loses 4 Laptops containing Crucial Data

Starbucks Corp., the world's largest coffee retailer said Friday that four laptop computers, two of which had private information about 60,000 current and former U.S. employees and some Canadian workers and contractors have been found missing from the company headquarters.

Valerie O'Neil, a spokeswoman for the Seattle-based company said that the three years old data includes names, addresses and Social Security numbers of the employees. She added that the company had realized about the missing computers on Sept. 6, when an employee "went to retrieve them in the normal course of business."

While Starbucks waited for two months before letting out the news, a thorough internal investigation was carried out. Weeks of investigation brought no results. Any reports of anyone's personal information have being compromised, have not been received by the company.

"We have no reason to believe these laptops are in the hands of someone who wants to misuse them," O'Neil said. "We're just doing everything we can to locate them and protect [employees] whose information was on them."

The people whose information is missing began working for Starbucks before Dec. 31, 2003. In a letter to those potentially affected, Starbucks urged people to keep an eye on their financial accounts for doubtful activity. The company also said it was offering free credit protection services to help them do that.

"Please know that we are exploring all avenues to locate these laptops, including reaching out to law enforcement agencies," the letter stated.

In order to prevent such data loss from happening again Starbucks is strengthening its corporate policies and updating procedures on protecting the personal information of its employees.

The company has created a Web site (starbuckspartnerinformation.com) and a phone line (800-453-1048) for employees to find out whether their data was lost and for any additional information about the free credit protection services.