I'm surprised it took this long:

WASHINGTON—Claiming that the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, "flagrantly disregarded the privacy rights of essentially every man or woman to have worn a United States military uniform," veterans groups today filed a massive class-action lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

The suit asks that the courts prohibit the VA from handling any personal, privacy protected data except under court supervision, and that the court create a set of "consensus minimal security standards" under which the VA can operate.

The suit also asks for damages of $1,000 for every person listed in the missing database files.
According to the suit, the information was unencrypted and easily available.
Wheee!
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1972946,00.asp

For me, as a vet, I don't want any money, just reimbursement if I have to pay for any credit reports and fixing my credit because of this, but just that they need controls in place to protect that data! Put the money towards that. But I want an outside audit firm to confirm controls are in place and are working.

Oh... wait... an update - oh boy - it just gets better:

VA: Data Theft Bigger than Reported

Secretary of Veterans Affairs R. James Nicholson has revealed that the data stolen from an employee's home in Maryland in May included personal information on over 1 million active duty, reserve and National Guard personnel.

Nicholson said the new information came to light when the Department of Defense compared electronic files.
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1973260,00.asp

Now they are "saying" that it was a smash and grab, however you may wish to keep track of your transactions and check with at least one of the Credit Bureaus (you can get a free credit report if there is fraud involved, or you can buy a 3-in-1 report) at your earliest convenience:

Equifax: http://www.equifax.com/

Experian: http://www.experian.com/

Transunion: http://www.transunion.com/index.jsp