http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercuryn ... 115.htm?1c
The task force leader, sheriff's lieutenant Robert Costa, said the number of people vulnerable to identity theft in the case could reach 500,000.
That's a much higher number than the latest estimate acknowledged by ChoicePoint, which belatedly sent warning letters to a total of 145,000 people in various states after politicians across the country joined a growing demand for tighter federal regulations.
An Alpharetta, Ga.-based spinoff from the credit-reporting giant Equifax, ChoicePoint maintains databases that hold Social Security numbers, credit and medical histories, motor vehicle registrations, job applications, lawsuits, criminal files, professional licenses and other pieces of sensitive information. ChoicePoint also owns a DNA analysis lab, facilitates drug testing for employers and sells background-checking software at Sam's Club.
But ChoicePoint and other privately owned aggregators of personal information operate with virtually no federal oversight, and critics say the companies haven't done enough to safeguard their information-rich databases.
``There's a serious problem that we as a nation don't seem to grasp -- that the public is at risk whenever organizations collect massive amounts of information about us and they don't take extraordinary precautions to ensure that that information is protected,'' said Larry Ponemon, who runs a research firm in Tucson, Ariz., dedicated to privacy management in business and government. ``People ought to be standing in lines protesting this.''
this shit pisses me off and makes me sick to my stomach. how can it be legal for any company to gather and collect personal information like this? my doctor isn't even allowed to leave a message on my answering machine thanks to HIPAA but these cocksuckers can sell software allowing anyone to do a background check on me? and how accountable are they being held for their lack of security? it's about enough to make me want to move out into the wilderness and say fuck you to society.
My goal is to live forever. So far so good.
The U. S. Constitution doesn't guarantee happiness, only the pursuit of it. You have to catch up with it yourself. - Benjamin Franklin
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