UH-OH: Inspector General Reveals Laptops Mysteriously Missing From Elizabeth Warren’s CFPB

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the brainchild of Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), is having difficulty accounting for laptops belonging to the agency. According to the CFPB’s Inspector General, a number of laptops have gone missing despite the agency sending out an “early alert memorandum,” on how to prevent inventory loss back in 2016.

National Law Review reports:

The CFPB’s Office of Inspector General has issued a report indicating that, in performing an audit of the CFPB’s encryption of data on mobile devices issued to staff members, the OIG found the CFPB had not yet completed all of the steps previously identified by the OIG to address the risk created by unaccounted-for-laptops.  Because of the sensitive nature of the information, the OIG only made an executive summary of the report publicly available.

According to the summary, the CFPB has been unable to provide a full accounting of all laptops that have been assigned to users since the CFPB’s establishment.  In June 2016, the OIG issued an “early alert memorandum” to the CFPB in which the OIG identified a number of steps the CFPB should take to gain assurance that the unaccounted-for-laptops did not prevent an unacceptable level of risk to the CFPB and to strengthen technical controls over protecting sensitive data.

The Inspector General’s report failed to provide any explanation as to why procedures for inventory management of agency computers were not followed, nor did the Office provide specifics on where any of the laptops could be located.

Reports of the agency’s poor computer management processes come on the heels of the Daily Caller’s Richard Pollock revealing renovation costs for the CFPB’s headquarters may place it on the list of top ten most expensive office buildings in Washington, D.C.

As the CFPB renovation costs continued to escalate, renovation was taken out of the CFPB’s hands and transferred to the General Services Administration (GSA). GSA’s budget, however, was nearly twice the original $55 million, hitting $99 million.

That figure ballooned to more than $124 million, according to a June 30, 2017, GSA document obtained by TheDCNF under the Freedom of Information Act. The document was part of a release of “change orders” and “modifications” submitted by Grunley Construction, the Washington, D.C.-based general contractor selected by GSA to renovate the CFPB building.

Why are costs so high? the CFPB forked over $88,000 just for bike racks and parking lot “striping.” Employees enjoy separate gyms for men and women, “sunken garden areas,” along with premium quartz countertops and an outdoor patio.

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