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A Matter Of Public Record
For Betty Ostergren, the solution to protecting privacy is simple: Keep public records public, but don't put them online.
(By Jay Paul For The Washington Post)
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In addition to providing citizens with information on how their government operates, many public records are essential for commerce.
Knowing who has legal title to property, for example, is necessary for real estate transactions. The presence of a tax lien can also affect a person's ability to buy or sell property or other goods. In some circumstances, Social Security numbers can help distinguish between people with common names.
But for decades, Social Security numbers, mothers' maiden names and other crucial forms of personal identity were routinely included in dozens of documents, regardless of whether they were essential and with little thought to the consequences.
That, in turn, enabled companies such as ChoicePoint to send workers to courthouses across the country to scoop up the data for their databanks. The information is collated, or analyzed, and sold to other companies and back to government agencies.
Many counties package their data to make it easier for database companies to collect it.
"Public records laws were designed to shed the light on government activities, not our personal information," said Kerry Smith, an attorney with Public Interest Research Groups, a coalition of state consumer advocacy organizations. States are "clearly not striking the right balance when they release our Social Security numbers -- the key to our financial identity -- to commercial data brokers and anyone with access to the Internet."
Some states have passed or are considering laws restricting the release of certain kinds of data. Florida, for instance, gives consumers the right to have Social Security numbers and other data blacked out from view online.
But few local governments have the resources to go into all existing online records to remove sensitive data.
"Usually when you are talking about these issues, no one is talking about it retroactively," said Chris Jay Hoofnagle, West Coast director of the Electronic Information Privacy Center, an advocacy group. "They are talking as if it can't be addressed. Which is too bad."
One exception is Orange County, Fla., which recently awarded a $500,000 contract to a private company that will comb through its 26 million pages of online records, masking Social Security numbers and other confidential information.
"The mortgage lenders and title searchers are very concerned that we are hiding things," said Carol Foglesong, the assistant county comptroller. "But my answer is, 'I sure don't want to take the whole document away.' "
The Florida Legislature has ordered the masking of data to be completed throughout the state by the beginning of 2006, but so far only eight counties have signed contracts for the work, said Foglesong, who expects an extension.
