Fears raised over Olympics IT volunteers

The former head of IT security for this summer's Olympic Games has raised concerns about the dependency on volunteers to operate the event's technology.

Dayle Wheeler recently left his position as security risk manager at Atos Origin, the company managing the Games technology, for personal reasons.

Before leaving, he told Computing that, even with formal background checks in place, he felt it is impossible to be secure about the status of the 3,000 volunteer workers.

'The biggest fear, that I don't have 100 per cent control over, is the personnel,' said Wheeler.

'Because an event is so integrated with the volunteering community, there's no formal background checking that will make me secure enough to say, "This is a 100 per cent secure person".'

All 3,400 IT staff and volunteers are subject to checks by the Greek Police and Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

An Atos Origin spokesperson says the background checks are exceptionally robust, and it has implemented the latest security monitoring technology to detect malicious activity.

See also:

IT security faces Olympian challenge

If all goes according to plan, the only Trojan Horse causing trouble in Athens this summer will be the one in the Hollywood blockbuster Troy.  04 Jun 2004

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