After a laptop breaks, where does it go? Your old work laptop, perhaps too slow to keep up with the growing pace of the Internet, is retired to the IT department, which issues you a nice, shiny new one. But what about all of your old files? Your data? Your client information?

While traveling abroad, a doctor had an unencrypted laptop containing information on roughly 3,500 patients stolen and this incident lead to a million dollar plus fine.

Imagine for a moment that you have a briefcase containing hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash belonging to your organization. How would you treat this briefcase? Would you leave it unattended in an unlocked area for significant periods of time? Maybe on the front seat of your vehicle while you went shopping, or perhaps on the table at the cafeteria while you go for a drink refill? Sounds absurd, right? Unfortunately, this is exactly what people continue to do every day with their organization’s critical data and information, whether it’s stored on mobile electronic devices or other portable media.

A NASA laptop stolen last year had not been encrypted, despite containing codes used to control and command the International Space Station.

With Super Bowl XLV just three weeks away, authorities in charge of security are dealing with their first test.