Hewlett-Packard's Patricia Dunn. (AP Photo/Paul Sakuma)

The saga of the HP Board of Directors investigating the leak of a rogue board member is almost over. The State of California is investigating the illegal tactics used to gain journalist phone records. Chairman Patricia Dunn is stepping down.

But HP is far from saying it's sorry. Dunn is staying on the Board and taking her sweet time to step down.

Why is it important? Because it's all too common. Almost every day there are new disclosures about hundreds of thousands of confidential consumer records lost, stolen, or made public. There are ongoing attacks on our computers via spam, spyware, or viruses.

Government does little and is far too slow. People are forced to rely on the goodwill of industry to safeguard their personal security and privacy.

But clearly we can't. This column has covered a litany of consumer abuse by top companies like Sony, Dell, Microsoft, and Time Warner AOL. The recording industry extorts thousands of dollars from innocent consumers in alleged file sharing.

HP was known for "The HP Way," which promoted "trust and respect for individuals". When the person at the top of the company acts perhaps criminally but certainly less than honorably, she has lost The Way. When the company lets her get away with a slap on the wrist, it has lost The Way. If HP, THE company known for its integrity, loses it, then corporate America has lost The Way. If business has lost The Way, then we consumers have lost as well.

The lack of trust means that consumers can rely only upon themselves to protect their anonymity, privacy, and security.

Charles Cooper say it's an important attackon privacy. I agree. He writes:

The HP affair is only the latest in a series of depressingly familiar incidents that underscore a painful truth: When it comes to privacy, expediency too often trumps principle. In the eyes of our best and brightest, it's just not very important. Congress grandstands but does little to give weight to its words. The president cuts corners, saying court-ordered permission to snoop is an encumbrance--and even harmful to national security.

Maybe it was too much to hope for better from the folks running HP. After all, they're just doing what everyone else does.