Reply #9: FL: Public records are easy targets for ID thieves [View All]

[freedomfries]

Public records are easy targets for ID thieves
Monika Hatcher
Miami Herald
August 27, 2006

The state's record keepers must delete sensitive personal information from government websites. Until that's done, many Floridians are in danger of having their identities stolen.

Forget lost or stolen laptops -- government websites are the real treasure troves for identity thieves, containing millions of searchable records brimming with Social Security numbers, dates of birth and all the ingredients criminals need to plunder bank accounts, ruin credit and wreck lives.

Recognizing the threat posed to citizens, the Florida Legislature passed a law four years ago requiring court clerks and county recorders to strike out personal information posted on the Web.

But the uncensored documents remain online, exposing hundreds of thousands of residents to identity theft, from schoolteachers and retirees to power brokers such as State Attorney Katherine Fernández Rundle and business mogul H. Wayne Huizenga.

The reason: Under pressure from the state's record keepers for more time, the Legislature has extended the deadline twice for completing the redaction, which was supposed to have been finished on Jan. 1. At the same time, the state set the same Jan. 1 deadline for photographic images of official records, including deeds, mortgages, liens, judgments and other public documents, to be available online.
The deadline to censor the online records is now Jan. 1, 2008.

A quick search of the Miami-Dade County Clerk's website, for instance, yielded the Social Security numbers of Miami Heat center Alonzo Mourning and Miami Herald publisher Jesús Díaz Jr., among other community notables. The same is true on Broward County's website, where Dolphins defensive end Jason Taylor's Social Security number is displayed.
...
That's not good enough, according to Bruce Hogman, a Broward County computer systems worker who is aghast at the lack of concern among public officials about the problem.

''If all the documents now in public view that contain identity data were on a stolen laptop, that would make front-page news,'' Hogman said.

``That the information is even more readily available to identity thieves and is paid for by our tax dollars is more incredible.''

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/business/15371751.htm