THE VIRGINIA WATCHDOG
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NEWS ARTICLES archives from 2003 thru latest update 11/17/08 about online records and politics
11/17/08 - Many state agencies across the U.S. allow people to take computers out of the office which are loaded with personal info such as Social Security numbers... read this article in the News Observer (Raleigh, NC). However, the numbers of SSNs put at risk on those laptops doesn't even compare with the number of SSNs in records made available by remote access by court clerks, Registrars/Recorder of Deeds, and Secretaries of State or records which are public records and available under FOIA laws that contain SSNs... Also update re: Colorado Sec. of State... Records with SSNs are still on his site. See link below to site.
10/10/08 - Computerworld covers latest SNAFU on Colorado Sec. of State's business search site. Read more below and see link to site.
10/07/08 - The Colorado Secretary of State, Mike Coffman, continues to have tons of SSNs on his "business search" website. The SSNs belong to powerful execs and other directors of major national companies and on some documents there are up to 100 SSNs along with home addresses. Coffman shut down the UCC search site last month but has left corporate big wheels exposed on this site that he refuses to shut down!
9/29/08 - "...ridiculous, reckless and irresponsible" says BJ Ostergren in a Rocky Mountain News article about Colorado Secretary of State, Mike Coffman, whose office refuses to protect SSNs by shutting down a SECOND site discovered on his webpage. Here's another article in the Grand Junction Sentinel about this latest mess in which many "corporation" documents that are on Coffman's site have SSNs on them, but the Secretary refuses to break links to all records until they can all be protected. This follows on the heels of the UCC records which he took off the site recently. Why not these business documents, Mr. Coffman? This same thing is happening all over the U.S. not just in Colorado.
9/24/08 - 1) Sec. of State Coffman has tons of SSNs available for the taking on another part of his business website. They are in articles of incorporation and reports made by corporations. Another snafu. And this guy wants to be a congressman? Maybe that's a good place for him with some other inept elected people that are there. He should shut this site down because it's a veritable treasure trove for identity thieves. His office was notified yesterday afternoon by email of this issue. Let's see how long it takes for him to come to his senses and protect powerful execs. 2) The Mesa County, CO Recorder also has SSNs online on her website that she won't shut down.
9/17/08 - The Colorado Sec. of State, Mike Coffman, came to his senses yesterday (too little too late?) and shut down online access to the UCC record images. We got the same site shut down in March 2007 and Coffman should never have allowed those records with SSNs back on the internet late last year. But he did. The good people of Colorado should hold him responsible for this SNAFU. Also someone should be fired. Now let's see how many other Colorado Recorders take records loaded with SSNs off their websites.
9/16/08 - The CO SOS Mike Coffman pulled docs off line yesterday that contained SSNs while many still remain on his site. BJ Ostergren proved to one of the SOS' employees late yesterday that SSNs remain on other documents filed in other years... Read an article in the Rocky Mountain News about this mess in today's paper. Coffman should resign. Hey you folks in Colorado, remember this fiasco when you vote in the next election. Ostergren was the one who forced them to pull down their site in March 2007 but they went back online late last year BEFORE protecting all the affected citizens. She didn't discover that they were back online until last Thursday and then she set about to get site shut down...again. Read how this happened...
9/15/08 - Montrose Daily Press reports about the mess regarding SSNs on the Colorado Sec. of State's website. SSNs are on that site by the thousands..and they are easy to find in the 2000-2005 records. The SOS refuses to shut that site down even after being told the SSNs are there. Obviously he doesn't care... Why doesn't someone file a class action lawsuit in Federal court and also ask for an injunction to shut the SOS' UCC search site down.
UPDATE ON UCC SEARCH SITE IN COLORADO... 09/12/08 7:15 PM EDT. The Colorado Sec. of State refuses to shut his UCC search site down and protect all the SSNS on his site by doing so. In a conversation with Rich Coolidge, his press secretary, they want ME to tell them where the SSNs are instead of doing them right thing and shutting the entire site down. They want to spoon feed criminals SSNs so we will help them. SSNs are on that site by the thousands...
BREAKING NEWS - 09/12/08- 12:30 PM EDT - A call was made to Colorado Governor Bill Ritter's office to ask him to make some phone calls to the Colorado Sec. of State (Mike Coffman) about the SSNs which are on the UCC search site and are mostly found in the 2001-2005 records. We realize the Governor has no control over the SOS but his office said he couldn't get involved. WHY NOT? Doesn't Governor Bill Ritter care about his constituents and the SSNs that have been put at risk. He could at least call Sec. Coffman and ask him why he's exposing thousands of Coloradans to potential identity theft. We spoke with Sarah in the Governor's office who was absolutely no help. Maybe the Governor should have taken our call himself since this is certainly making him look like he couldn't care less. When these people get elected, do they really think they become royalty? They act like it...
FRIDAY, 09/12/08
1) Last year on March 29, 2007, The Virginia Watchdog was successful in getting the Colorado Secretary of State's UCC search site shut down. However, we found out just yesterday afternoon that Sec. of State Mike Coffman (R) allowed the site to go back online with SSNs last December. Since yesterday afternoon we have been downloading UCCs complete with SSNs off the search site. It is astounding that his office "tried" to black out the SSNs but failed so miserably by missing thousands. His office was contacted yesterday afternoon, but no one was available to talk about this mess... Sec. Coffman should resign for allowing this to happen.
2) On a better note, the Montrose County, Colorado Recorder, Fran Tipton Long, is breaking links to the images on her land records search site today. The Virginia Watchdog's BJ Ostergren called her yesterday afternoon and told her that even though she had broken the links last week to the images of the UCCs and Federal Tax liens her website was still loaded with SSNs on records like Powers of Attorney and mortgage documents. She promised us that her site would be shut down until she can deal with all the SSNs and protect her constituents.
3) Lastly, this Iowa Land Records site was shut down...finally on 9/10/08. It was announced at a press conference this week that they would break the links to the images of records indefinitely until the legislature, the Ombudsman's office, and the Governor can agree on how to proceed without spoon feeding criminals. Governor Chet Culver's SSN was on that site along with many thousands of others. Here is an article from last week in which the Governor's initial call to shut the site down was denied and here is an article in the Des Moines Register about the shut down. But other Iowa Recorders' sites are still spoon feeding criminals.
4) The court side of the Pulaski County, Arkansas Clerk's site is still online complete with potentially dangerous info such as SSNs, abused women's home and work addresses, and illegitimate children's names and dates of birth. The Clerk, Patrick O'Brien, refuses to shut down that half of the site. So now an Arkansas citizen has published emails gotten under the Freedom of Information act and published them. Go to the emails and read them. Most are innocuous, but some... Well, read them yourself.
5) This sort of online records with SSNs mess is happening all over the United States.
09/08/08 - 1) Iowa Land Records continues to spoon feed SSNs to the world. They refuse to shut the site down even though the Governor asked them to pull the plug. This political cartoon by Brian Duffy (published in the Des Moines Register) says it all. 2) In Colorado, a Recorder broke the links to Federal Tax liens and UCCs. A good start but many SSNs remain on that Montrose County Recorder's site as well as many other Colorado Recorders' websites as well. 3) Also... U.S. Sen. Joe Biden once referred to Jesse Jackson as "boy." Wonder if he refers to Obama as "boy?" Hhhhmmm. Sad, but true, according to this column.
9/06/08 - The latest article about the Iowa mess where they have been spoon feeding criminals for years. QUESTIONS for Iowans to ask: 1) How much is the company head making in salary (almost $90,000 we're told thru a " gov't grant") and 2) how much is the company making for each record recorded ($5) and put on the site? People have been telling them for years that there were SSNs on that site To get the point across about how dangerous online records is, make sure to click on "SKIP LOGIN - GET SSNs" on this link and then keep going. It's a hoot but makes great points. This is the link to the real site (Iowa Land records) where the SSNs are but it's offline temporarily. Keep in mind...it's not just Iowa that's putting SSNs online. What we are witnessing in Iowa is happening all over this country.
9/02/08 - 3:15 PM - Is anyone going to pull the plug on this Iowa public records website to protect people who have no clue that their SSN, credit card #, unlisted home phone number, etc. may be on a record on that site? Read this Des Moines Register article about the situation. This same thing is happening all over this country...
9/02/08 - BREAKING NEWS!!! IOWA is spoon feeding criminals worldwide. The Iowa Recorders Association's website found at http://www.iowalandrecords.org is supplying criminals around the world - for free - hundreds of thousands of innocent people's Social Security numbers on "land" records - including the SSNs belonging to Gov. Chet Culver and Sec. of State Michael Mauro and his wife.
8/30/08 - 1) A must read... "Who's reading your medical files today." Farrah Fawcett found out the hard way when a hospital employee sold her information to a tabloid paper even though she sought cancer treatment under an "assumed name." Send this must read article by Sue Blevins to all your friends. Let's take back control of our private medical information. 2) And if someone getting into your medical info wrongfully isn't bad enough, here's a new citizen site about Pulaski County, Arkansas and the online records mess there. Patrick O'Brien, the Pulaski Clerk of Court, has only shut down half of his website but still has his court records site online complete with illegitimate children's names and their DOBs, abused women's home and work addresses, people's personal medical information, and Social Security numbers. The Pulaski County, AR Court Clerk isn't the only clerk across the U.S.A. putting records online with personal information in them. No, it's happening all over this country and The Virginia Watchdog has chronicled the battle to stop it, but, like in Virginia, legislatures seem to want people's personal (albeit public) information online since little if anything has been done to protect the records. Many states' Recorders, Registers of Deeds, and Secretaries of States are spoon feeding criminals Social Security numbers by the hundreds of thousands...and the public has no clue. 3) Here's another article about the lawsuit below. The Commonwealth of VA's legislature passed a bill this past session aimed directly at BJ Ostergren, founder of The Virginia Watchdog, in which they sought to take away her First Amendment rights.
8/25/08 - Betty J. Ostergren v. Robert McDonnell, Attorney General of VA - Read the ACLU's press release and then read the Memorandum Opinion rendered by Federal Judge Robert Payne on August 22, 2008. Hearing was held Aug. 14th. Here is an AP Article and a Richmond Times Dispatch article about it.
7/1/08 - RE: BJ Ostergren's lawsuit (see 6/11/08 news below) re: public records, SSNs, and First Amendment rights filed against VA's Attorney General. Hearing was 6/30/08 in Federal Court. This is in the Virginian Pilot and this is in the Richmond Times-Dispatch
7/1/08 - UPDATE RE: Circuit Court Clerk in Pulaski County, AR. In his Court records website, he still has SSNs showing. One record we found showed a man's SSN 10+ different times... plus he also has home and work addresses of domestic abuse victims, divorce decrees showing minor children's names, addresses, and DOBs! How reckless is all this??? Very...but he says "they're public records."
06/26/08 - 7:30 P.M. EDT - Late today the Circuit Court Clerk of Pulaski County, AR pulled the plug on his land records website due to public outcry about his having thousands of SSNs on the internet and open to the world in those records. Therefore, we are breaking the links to the public records we published in the two articles below which showed certain people's SSNs. But he still has COURT records online loaded with SSNs. Something has to be done about that part of his site. The Arkansas Democrat Gazette is covering this as well.
06/26/08 - Update re: Pulaski County (AR) - The Circuit Court Clerk, Pat O'Brien, continues to refuse to pull the plug on his website. His site continues to spoon feed literally tens of thousands of SSNs to all over the world, but he has blacked out a few. Wonder whose?
06/25/08 - Just discovered - another Circuit Court Clerk spoon feeding criminals on the World Wide Web. This one is in Pulaski County, Arkansas (Little Rock area).
Update - 6/13/08 -Computerworld article by Jaikumar Vijayan about ACLU suit.
Update - 6/12/08 - Dan Genz of the Washington Examiner wrote this article about the Federal Court case involving BJ Ostergren
06/11/08 - Today the ACLU of Virginia filed this Complaint in Federal Court which seeks to protect Betty "BJ" Ostergren's First & Fourteenth Amendment rights after the 2008 Virginia General Assembly unanimously trampled on them by passing two companion bills which will become law on July 1. They were signed into law by Gov. Tim Kaine. Read an AP article published today about the lawsuit.
In a March 15, 2008 AP news article about the bills, Senator R. Edward Houck (D) admitted that the "goal" of the legislation was "stopping people like Ostergren from publishing Social Security numbers" even if they are on public records.
The new law doesn't stop a "public body" (like Circuit Court Clerks) from publishing records with SSNs on them on their remote access systems so in other words, the legislators have passed a "Do as I say, not as I do" law.
The lawmakers apparently didn't like it when we printed some of their records.
Here's an editorial that was in the Charlottesville, VA's Daily Progress in response to that AP article which supports Ostergren.
Ostergren will be on WRVA's Jimmy Barrett show at 7:05 AM on Friday, June 13th. Click here to listen online.
6/11/08 - SSNs are still all over the Riverside Court website on records dealing with Small Claims and Civil cases. Talk about spoon feeding criminals...
5/14/08 - The Press-Enterprise today has this news article by Richard De Atley about the Riverside County (CA) Superior Court which still has their website open to the world exposing thousands and thousands of SSNs. Wonder why the Judge just won't order the site shut down or make it a "pay per view" site? Read more from Privacy Pete about the P-E article See a video about all this mess that someone has put on the internet showing records from that court site.
5/04/05 - More on Riverside Superior Court web site situation re: SSNs and other personal info being on that site... Computerworld posted this latest article "Privacy watchdog ratchets up effort to get county court to block document access" (see documents they talk about linked below in next paragraph) and Privacy Pete has this to say in a post which the CHP Forum has removed, but here it is for all to read...
05/02/08 8:45AM EDT - California should not be considered "a leader" in safe guarding sensitive data since SSNs are all over the Riverside Superior Court Small Claims and Civil Cases web site where over 20 million records can be found. Take a look at these examples of public records with SSNS on them found there - like this one for the Mayor of Riverside... this one... this one and this one which are on that court site for the taking by anyone in the world.
Read a Computerworld article about this situation. Now read "Privacy Pete's" reply to Gary Whitehead's comments in that article. Here is Privacy Pete's original post to a CHP website/forum alerting the CHP to this mess since over 1,000 are affected by the idiocy of posting these records online.
Other personal info like health information, health insurance policy numbers, DOBs, minor children's names plus their SSNs, tax returns with even the "preparer's" SSN shown, restricted police report information, bank account numbers, people's home addresses and phone numbers, physical descriptions of people, signatures, and much much more can also be found with a little patience and know how.
The Court's Chief Deputy Executive Officer/Director of IT, Gary Whitehead, tried to make one reporter yesterday think that finding this stuff was like looking for a needle in a haystack. Wrong, Mr. Whitehead! It's actually like taking candy from a baby.
The Riverside court and others were told several weeks ago that this problem existed when a concerned California citizen (Privacy Pete) alerted them, but no one did much of anything except to get one sealed court case off the court site that should never have been there in the first place.
The site is an identity thief's dream and is open to the world.
A call by us yesterday to the Presiding Judge, Richard Fields, to discuss this issue went unreturned.
Developing....
UPDATE - 04/28/08 - 2:30 PM - Recently the Riverside (California) Superior Court system has been in the news for tossing out felony cases. Now we find out today that same Court site is exposing thousands and thousands of SSNs (including those belonging to over 1,000 California Highway Patrolmen) on pleadings and other court filings... Read more about the felony cases...
UPDATE - 04/28/08 - 4:30 PM - California a leader in protecting private info? No, No...not after what was discovered today on a state website there. See below post and find out why California like many states is also spoon feeding criminals worldwide.
04/28/08 - 2:30 PM Read this post. The Virginia Watchdog's own BJ Ostergren went into the Riverside Superior Court site today and found many SSNs. What the hell is that court thinking about? The person - "Privacy Pete" - who contacted us about this has tried for over two months to get the documents off that site until the court can at least redact the SSNs since many California Highway Patrolmen's SSNs are there for the world to see. His concerns are legitimate. Also on the same site are mother's maiden names, DOBs, and other personal info. Read this Press-Enterprise article about the felony cases being tossed.
04/09/08 - 9 PM - The Washington Post reports that House staffers in D.C. are livid over the LEGISTORM website which has some of the best info on it about how much the Congressional staffers are paid, trips legislators have taken, financial statements, etc. But it is obvious that the staffers have no clue that Circuit Court Clerks in Virginia as well as two other agencies in Maryland (the State Archives and the Dept. of Assessment and Taxation) are publishing public records with SSNs on them plus lots of other personal info. Also the D.C. Recorder is selling records for $4 a piece. Yep! More info is on those sites than what Legistorm is printing...
NOTE TO READERS : Here's another link to get to the AP story by Dena Potter that was reprinted in many VA newspapers. It is the whole article and not the abridged version some papers re-printed.
03/19/08 - 1:45 PM - Computerworld's article about the new law aimed at The Virginia Watchdog.
03/18/08 - 12:15 PM - The Virginian Pilot's column about the new law aimed at this web site and BJ Ostergren...
03/16/08 - 7 PM - Many states' Court Clerks or Recorders have put records online with SSNs showing. Virginia is not the only idiot state to do this. Here's an article about a county in Oklahoma spoon feeding criminals...
03/15/08 - 5:15 PM - The Associated Press article about the new law targeting BJ Ostergren and The Virginia Watchdog web site. PogoWasRight.org has this editorial - "Virginia plays 'shoot the messenger' and targets a privacy advocate."
03/15/08 - BREAKING NEWS - Was Gov. Timothy Kaine absent from his Harvard Law School class when they covered Constitutional law? Apparently he was since he just signed into law a bill that violates this web site's First and Fourteenth Amendments. Read more...
01/04/08 - Gov. Tim Kaine apparently has no clue as the massive number of SSNs (read this Washington Post article) and personal info that are in court and land records that Virginia Circuit Court Clerks are spoon feeding to anyone with a computer and a few bucks. Kaine wants identity theft bills introduced, but yet isn't planning on dealing with the SSNs in the Clerk's records. Legislation was introduced last year that would have mandated the removal of SSNs in the records, but it failed. We have no clue what steps VA is taking unless this year some legislator steps forward and finally gets something done to protect SSNs in those records. Here is a link to an NBC NEWS piece shown last night with video link.
01/02/08 - Read this WASHINGTON POST article about the government putting SSNs online. And this article about county websites helping ID thieves. When will state legislators wake up? Tell your friends about The Virginia Watchdog website.
09/27/07 - A check this morning shows that the Pasco County (FL) Clerk of Court has now protected the Brownings (see two stories below) and blacked out their SSNs, but he has many more SSNs on his site since most people in Pasco County have no clue these records are even on the internet. It took only minutes to find some this morning. If you live in Pasco County, Florida you'd better check all your records on the Court Clerk's site and then make a request to have your SSN removed... Also coming soon - a complete expose of how Virginia citizens have been duped by our legislators about removal of SSNs on public records. We thought the Circuit Court Clerks would have all SSNs removed off internet records by July 1, 2010, but nope, there is no date...Article coming shortly.
09/23/07 - Ostergren threatened with prosecution in emails from legal counsel to Florida Sec. of State Kurt Browning for publishing Sec. and Mrs. Browning's record that she got off a public website - the Pasco County Clerk's Official Records search site. Read the emails exchanged here. Also...as of late Friday, images of records have now been removed from the Pasco County Clerk's Official Records search site.
09/21/07 - Florida Secretary of State, Kurt S. Browning, still has SSNs on the Florida UCC search site. Since many private citizens' SSNs continue to be shown on that site, then it's only fair to show Browning's own public record complete with his and his wife's SSNs...
07/27/07 - We hate to be the ones who said "We told you so" to all stupid Court Clerks, Recorders, and Secretaries of State, etc who insist on spoon feeding criminals by putting records online containing sensitive personal info like SSNs, but... The Virginia Watchdog has been trying to wake up this country about exactly what is mentioned in this article. At least 27 known victims in this one case, but cops predict there are hundreds more. In May the Franklin County "Recorder" blocked access to many records that contained SSNs but left many online. (Read articles below from May this year about that.) This type of "spoon feeding criminals" is going on all over this country since many Clerks etc have gone online. Oh, and there is a much easier way to find SSNs in those records. That Ohio woman went about it the hard way. The Virginia Watchdog's BJ Ostergren has downloaded/printed out over 20,000 SSNs but she has found millions of SSNs on these sites including these. Virginia legislators unanimously passed a law 10 years ago allowing records like the ones used by the Ohio woman to be put online complete with SSNs. It's just taken time to get the records ready for internet access but 58 Clerks offer "remote" access. So since they want the records online, the legislators' records will be posted on this site as we find them. And here's another story about Troy Aikman's and wife's SSNs being found on the Texas Sec. of State's site. And just who told Steven Peisner about the SSNs on that site? BJ Ostergren, who would like to thank Steven for helping her out in trying to get that site shut down. But a note to Aikman...You're still at risk because your SSN is STILL on a Clerk's site...
07/20/07 - Houston Chronicle article about SSNs on Texas Secretary of State's UCC search site (Note to readers: Troy Aikman's and wife's SSNs have now been blacked out on the Secretary's site as of late yesterday, but Aikman's SSN remains on another site in Texas put there by an elected official. QUESTION: Did the Aikmans put in the required written request to have their numbers protected? Or did the Sec. of State just protect them but none of the hundreds of thousands of others whose SSNs remain open to the world for a buck a piece on the UCC site?
07/19/07 - Privacy is under attack in many states including Texas where millions of public records have been put online even with SSNs on them. The Sec. of State Phil Wilson is spoon feeding criminals with his UCC Search site which has almost zero security on it. Read this article in PC WORLD. Troy Aikman's and wife's SSNs and hundreds of thousands of other people's SSNs are available for sale for a buck per UCC record on that Sec. of State's site if the numbers haven't already been blacked out for them. Texas Court Clerks have put millions of records online with SSNs and other personal info also. Phil Wilson isn't the only stupid person putting people at risk. Regarding the Clerks' sites, some charge for access and some do not. But The Virginia Watchdog has found Troy Aikman's SSN on another record on a different site in Texas - FREE for the taking and put online by an elected official - the Clerk! Plus we have found Texas legislators' SSNs, too, on the same types of records! The Virginia Watchdog has played an important part in getting SSNs off records and also in getting many Sec. of States' UCC search sites shut down like California, Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, New York, Vermont, Missouri, Ohio, Florida, and others. The stories about all those can be found below in other articles.
07/18/07 - The Virginia General Assembly has screwed us again. Where were the veterinarians when legislation about dog rabies certificates was going thru? We didn't see them down there speaking against the bill that will allow rabies vaccination certificates to become PUBLIC records, there by allowing ANYONE to dip into your business and find out what dogs you own. The info can be sold by the City and County government. When your dog gets a rabies shot, the vet has to mail a duplicate copy to the Treasurer of the locality where the shot was given and then even though it's a good way to track dog licenses, the rabies certificate now becomes open season and ANYONE can buy the info. But guess who wants this info public so they can get to it and who spoke against a bill that would have allowed the citizens to "opt out" - The Virginia Press Association's lobbyist, The Virginia Coalition for Open Gov't's executive director (who also helped push to get final divorce decrees, deeds, judgments, etc available on the internet), the databrokers who deal in selling our personal info, and the Dog Wardens who asked for this legislation originally. Solution: Take your dogs out of state for their rabies shots. Here's the way one bill could have protected our info HB 2558. Here is how the bill started out (see line 25) and here's how it ended up (see line 25). Keep in the mind the wording at the top that leaves it up to the "holder" of the info at the City/County and says they MAY release the information anyway... "The following records are excluded from the provisions of this chapter [the Freedom of Information Act] but may be disclosed by the custodian in his discretion..." All the info on the rabies certificate is put on the license when you buy it... The tax laws in VA make any info about personal property confidential EXCEPT the amount of taxes one pays but no one is supposed to be able to find out exactly what personal property someone owns. (COV 58.1-3 A) But keep this in mind...when you get a prescription filled, the pharmacist has to report your personal info to "big brother" if it's a certain drug type like pain killers (like darvocet) and narcotics. That is worse than the dog rabies certificate issue... Click here to see what a Schedule II, III, or IV drugs are. All your info including your SSN then is included in a database... Look at the info the pharmacist reports. This program created by our VA General Assembly is supposed to track who is buying those drugs but it's an invasion into our medical privacy.
07/17/07 - 1) Growing number of County officials blame vendors for expunged record "breaches" 2) National agency warns homeowners of deed fraud
07/13/07 - 1) I.D. Theft Watchdog Finds the State of Texas is Wide Open for I.D. Thieves (NOTE TO READERS: But Texas isn't the only state spoon feeding criminals... and the Secretary of State there isn't the only elected official in Texas who has put SSNs on the internet - Court Clerks are putting SSNs and other personal info online, too. 2) Wall Street Journal Online article about "When public records are too public" mentions BJ Ostergren. 3) Ohio Sec. of State still trying to get all SSNs removed off the UCCs. 4) Florida continues to have SSNs online also. A check this morning revealed SSNs still on the FL Sec. of State's UCC website. 5) Why would legislators allow Clerks/Recorders or Sec. of States to put SSNs and other personal info online with all the other databreaches that have occurred? 6) Also read an article about GAO report recognizing ID theft problem and SSNs. 7) And...about the red light cameras which VA legislators voted this past session to allow, read this about an Ohio man who has filed suit over them in Ohio.
06/01/07 - Hey Texas Att. Gen. Abbott, no one has to dumpster dive or break the law to get SSNs and other personal info in your state because Court Clerks AND the Secretary of State are all spoon feeding criminals and putting MILLIONS of people at risk. Why just prosecute Easy Pawn? Names, signatures, SSNs, DoBs, health info, and other info are all on records like judgments, Powers of Attorney, tax liens, mortgages, guardianship papers, final divorce decrees, and UCCs. "Cracking down" as you say is important but what about elected officials who have put records online complete with all the info an identity thief needs to screw up someone's life... If people want to see public records, they should have to drive to the courthouse! Here are examples of records online in BEXAR COUNTY where you filed the suit. #1...... #2......#3...and here's one from Ft. Bend County and all have SSNs on them. And then the Sec. of State there is selling SSNs for a buck a piece on his UCC site to ANYONE who signs up! You must not be too worried about identity theft or you'd help get these sites shut down. Here's Att. Gen. Abbott's video of his press conference yesterday.
05/29/07 - ATHENS COUNTY (OHIO) RECORDER PUTS RECORDS BACK ONLINE. So here are some examples of records that Recorder Scott wants online...including her own complete with SSNs.
05/26/07- Columbus Dispatch article about the Franklin Recorder pulling plug on mortgage records. He'll break links to other records that he has on his site ASAP. NEXT...on to Cuyahoga County Recorder's site next. People are already being called by The Virginia Watchdog's BJ Ostergren. If you know where to look, you can find thousands of SSNs. That site should be shut down immediately since it's spoon feeding criminals and has been for years...
05/25/07 - The FRANKLIN COUNTY, OHIO RECORDER, Robert G. Montgomery is spoon feeding criminals, too, like Athens County was doing and like many Ohio Recorders are also doing by having records online complete with SSNs. The Virginia Watchdog's BJ Ostergren has been into the Franklin County site and downloaded different types of records with SSNs, signatures, and dates of birth on them. Almost 30 mortgage companies put SSNs on mortgages in the 90s but they are also on "judgments". Read this article in the Columbus Dispatch by reporter Josh Jarman about the situation. The Franklin County Recorder needs to break the links to the images of the records TODAY! The public has to get involved and get the links to the images broken.
05/20/07 - Here's an article in the ATHENS (Ohio) MESSENGER by Casey Elliott about the Athens County records with SSNs being online. Here's how BJ Ostergren got the links to the records broken...
05/09/07 - IRS proposal could impact millions of internet users. (Note to readers: Clerks and Recorders all over the US are spoon feeding criminals by putting records (albeit public records) online that contain SSNs and other personal info. Some Secretaries of State are also putting people at risk. Click here to see examples of some records that have been found online courtesy of an elected official. Many Clerks/Recorders have records online with personal info exposed, but some are worse than others. To find out what records are online in your county, call the Court Clerk or Recorder and ask them if they are online and what records they are showing...or email us your state/county name and we'll find out for you if you are at risk.)
05/03/07 - Florida lawmakers screw up again. Read Miami Herald article about the date to remove SSNs off internet records being extended to 01/01/11 and in which The Virginia Watchdog's BJ Ostergren is quoted . And read a previous Miami Herald article from August 2006 about this situation and comments from Ostergren. Some FL Clerks have redacted SSNs already while others don't even have contracts...Wouldn't it make more sense to shut down those websites until the records are scrubbed of that info? YOU BET! But they shouldn't have been online in the first place. Most states and Washington, D.C. are also putting records online complete with SSNs...Some states are worse than others. Click here for examples of Florida records.
04/23/07 _ The Texas AG is waging war on CVS for allegedly dumping customers' personal info into a dumpster, but what about Texas Court Clerks who are putting records online complete with SSNs like this one...and this one...and this one...and this one and millions more like them? The Texas legislature made it legal for them to put SSNs online AND the Texas Sec. of State is selling UCCs for a buck a piece...
04/21/07 - Federal database exposes SSNs of those who got loans or financial aid thru agriculture programs. (Note to readers - But Clerks of Court, Registers of Deeds, Recorders and Sec. of States have been putting records online that contain SSNs by the thousands and also other personal info. While some states have taken records off line, Virginia legislators are forcing all Clerks to go online with their records. 58 Clerks are already offering online access...)
04/16/07 1) Virginia State Compensation Board pulls $52,280 from Circuit Court Clerk for lying about having records online. NOTE to readers - ANYONE can sign up to access the records since VA law and a December 2002 VA Attorney General opinion say they shall be open to everyone. That article gives another impression that they are only open to those people with legitimate business use. WRONG! Secondly, there is no such thing as a "secure" remote system. But VA legislators think there is. Here are some of their records with SSNs on them. Here are the minutes to the SCB's meeting where they voted to take the Charlottesville CC Clerk's money back after he lied. See pages 14 and 30. I think that's called fraud. 2) IF you missed this last summer on CNN about this situation and The Virginia Watchdog's founder, read this and see video for free now... What you see in that video is happening all over this country... but some states are worse than others.
04/07/07 -1) Massachusetts Sec. of the Commonwealth Bill Galvin doesn't want to protect the UCC records so here's a "HOW TO SEARCH" primer to use on his site and find SSNs... and an example of a state Senator's UCC record with TWO SSNs. 2) Groups call on Galvin to disable UCC site but he refuses.
04/06/07 (1915 hrs EDT) - Read the latest AP coverage from today in the BOSTON GLOBE and the latest article in Computerworld about the MASS mess. Galvin's office would have everyone to believe that this mess will be taken care of in couple of weeks. He's wrong. It will take months. He also says that every year about 5,500 records have SSNs on them. We found them on late 2001 thru early 2005 docs. How would anyone like to one of the approx. 25,000+ whose SSN is on the internet right now? I think that number is underestimated by his office. But one is too many.
04/05/07 1315 EDT - BOSTON METRO covers Mass mess where there are thousands of SSNs on the UCC search site. The SOC sounds like he is trying to downplay the issue.
04/05/07 0945 EDT - Personal data at risk in lost IRS laptops, but Sec. of the Commonwealth of Mass is spoon feeding criminals with his open access to the UCCs.
04/05/07 0830 EDT - Pot calling kettle black? Mass Sec. of the Commonwealth, William Francis Galvin, fined a company in December - Ameriprise Financial Services Inc. of Minneapolis -$25,000 to settle a probe by Galvin's office for a databreach. Well, Mr. Secretary, you continue to spoon feed SSNs to ANYONE ANYWHERE in the world with the SSNs on your UCC search site on documents recorded from 2001 thru 2005...
04/05/07 - Hey, Sec. Galvin, here's an article you should read about medical identity theft. This is what people can do with all those SSNs you're spoon feeding to criminals on your website on 2001-2005 UCC records. You should break the links to the images now. VT, NY, CO, CA, MO, AZ, OR, and others have done so. A "summary" will suffice for commercial purposes. If other states can deal only with a "summary" of UCCs online, then I'm sure your state could do the same. It's going to take months to black out all the SSNs on your site - not a couple weeks like you would like people to believe...
04/04/07 1705 EDT - Government arrogance in Massachusetts! The Sec. of the Commonwealth, WIlliam Francis Galvin, refuses to break the links to the images of records containing SSNs. Here's an AP story by Ken Maguire about the issue in the Boston Globe just put online. There needs to be a class action suit like the one filed in March 2006 in Ohio resulting in a Federal Court judge ordering the SSNs removed from that Sec. of State's site. That also cost that SOS the governor's race last year! (NOTE TO SOC Galvin...Don't break the links to the images because an "activist" from VA asked you to...Break them because it is the RIGHT thing to do!)
04/04/07 - The Massachusetts Secretary of the Commonwealth is spoon feeding criminals tens and tens of thousands of Social Security Numbers on the UCC search website. The Virginia Watchdog's founder, BJ Ostergren, contacted the Secretary's office at 8:50AM EDT today and requested that all links to the images of the UCC records be broken until they can manually redact ALL SSNs. She also spoke to Dan Wandell in the Corporations Division and went online with him to show him where SSNs are all over the site. The UCCs (financing statements) typically from 2001 thru 2005 contained SSNs or Federal Tax ID # (or both) of the person who was the debtor. These records can be for people who bought mobile homes, Snap-On tools, John Deere equipment, Kubota equipment, Caterpillar equipment...anything really but they "financed it"! How long will it take the SOC to protect the people of MA who are adversely affected by this? More later...
04/01/07 - News story KNXT TV (ABC 15) yesterday about the ARIZONA SEC. OF STATE shutting down their website Friday. Here's an AP story about it. That site should have been shut down years ago...
03/30/07 1600 hrs EDT - Today The Virginia Watchdog targeted the Arizona Secretary of State's website where literally thousands and thousands of SSNs were available on UCC (financing statements) and Tax Liens. The first phone call was made to their office at 0833 hrs MST today asking them to shut the site down or break the links to the images and by 1300 hrs MST, the links to the IMAGES had been broken. The SOS has now protected the records and the SSNs on them! One day - that's all it took and we'd like to thank the Arizona Farm Bureau for its help with this.
03/30/07 - 1) TEXAS GOP calls for TEXAS Gov. to veto a bill giving Court Clerks immunity. and 2) The Virginia Watchdog is now trying to get the AZ SOS Jan Brewer to break links to images of UCCs/State Tax liens which are on her website by the hundreds of thousands. The Virginia Watchdog left a message in the SOS' office about this situation at 0833 hrs MST today about the thousands and thousands of SSNs on that site.
03/29/07 (1945 hrs EDT) - It has just been discovered that the Colorado Sec of State, Mike Coffman, has wisely pulled the plug on his website that was spoon feeding criminals. SSNs were all over the website and available to anyone for free. Here is the link to his Business site (see red writing) about it and his press release put out at 4:56 P.M. MDT. Sec. Coffman has protected thousands of citizens by pulling the plug. Now if only Maryland and others would do the same.
03/29/07 (1530 hrs EDT) - 1) The Virginia Watchdog's founder, BJ Ostergren, has been told just this afternoon that the Colorado Secretary of State is not shutting down the UCC and Federal Tax Liens search site. Read more... and 2) Re: Virginia - Richmond Times-Dispatch's Peter Bacque reports that Virginia's legislative information website put over 32,000 citizens' names, phone numbers, and addresses at risk. Thank you, Mr. Charles Hague, for discovering this fiasco and stopping it.
03/26/07 - Dan Goodin of The Register reports California cuts off aid to ID thieves. The Virginia Watchdog's founder, BJ Ostergren is currently trying to get Maryland's two sites shut down. SSNs are all over the place on two sites put online by the state Judiciary and the State archives AND the Dept of Assessments and Taxation where the UCCs are. The Virginia Watchdog has been downloading records off both the sites and have called many people about it. Here are links to some sites where UCCs are with SSNs on them.
03/25/07 - More about California selling people out. And here's a TV piece about the California mess. Now let's get Maryland and others like Massachusetts to stop aiding and abetting ID thieves. See more about that under the "Special Notice" on TVW's main page and below.
03/23/07 1315 hrs - 1) California Assemblyman Dave Jones' legislative aide, Soren Tjernell, was educated about the California Sec. of State Debra Bowen's site by The Virginia Watchdog's BJ Ostergren on March 1 after contacting her about a California Privacy bill put in by Jones. (See 3/02/07 entry below for more on this.) Ostergren showed him sites put online by elected officials around the country where SSNs are available by the hundreds of thousands and then she showed him the CA SOS site where they, too, were spoon feeding SSNs to the world. Tjernell bought a record for a few bucks and it had a SSN on it. He was astounded. Assemblyman Jones and his office should be thanked by California citizens for then taking this bull by the horn and getting the SOS to shut down. Here is a TV story about the issue , an Orange County Register article, a Sacramento Bee article , a Daily Breeze article and how the site has been shut down but they should even reconsider using the last four numbers because the last four are also keys that will open many doors. This latest follows on the heels of many who have seen the light thanks to The Virginia Watchdog and who have decided to protect SSNs that are on those records. But many like Maryland, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Texas, Indiana, and others remain online. AND 2) the Texas legislature has just kicked the citizens in the teeth there when they killed the law that the Attorney General was relying on which made the Court Clerks shut down their records' sites a few weeks ago which are still a treasure trove for SSNs. Guess the legislators don't care about identity theft in that state. Here is an article about the bill passed by both Texas House and Senate after it was hurriedly introduced and now it heads to the Governor All you Texans should vote out everyone of your legislators for this. Many people have no clue the records are online thanks to Court Clerks and so they won't know to ask to have their SSN protected...
03/16/07 - 1) We already know that our records held by state agencies like Court Clerks and other elected officials are not safe, but read this by Mary Elizabeth Fratini... Are your medical records safe? New statewide patient database raises privacy concerns which is in the Vermont Guardian. Email all your friends to read this article. 2) Also for all you Arizona folks...the Maricopa Recorder is finally removing SSNs from their online records which is a good start, but what about those kids' names, DOBs, and other info in those Divorce papers or on Death Certificates? Helen Purcell has long known she was spoon feeding criminals...Her site was prominently featured in a CNN piece last June. The Virginia Watchdog's BJ Ostergren was in the same piece which was shown many times on CNN shows and also on Headline News.
03/15/07 - Congressman Markey calls for stronger privacy protections of medical information. But what about the lack of it with HIPAA? Don't deal with just lost or stolen info...What is YOUR Congressman doing about the lack of protection with HIPAA?
03/14/07- 1) Care about who sees your medical info? Heather Acosta did. And there will be more lawsuits because HIPAA is a joke when it comes to privacy. 2) C/NET NEWS reports... Medical data on 75,000 Empire Blue Cross members may be lost including SSNs. That follows the fiasco in Oct. 2006 when 196,000 people's info was stolen... But keep this in mind - Court Clerks, Recorders/Registers of deeds, and Secretaries of State are putting millions of people at risk by having records on their websites complete with SSNs, DOBs, signatures, fiancial acc't numbers, mothers maiden names, and minor children's names...
03/12/07- 1) Why should any identity thief have to hack, dumpster dive, or phish when Circuit Court Clerks/Recorders/Secretaries of State are putting records online that contain personal inform? Read this New York Time's article about "IDENTITY CRISIS. 2) Charlottesville, VA's Daily Progress article "ONLINE RECORDS STIRS DEBATE" (TVW's note: the City of Charlottesville Circuit Court Clerk certified to the State Compensation Board that he had "remote" access to his records last summer, but this article says he doesn't...)
03/08/07 - CNET News reports Bill Gates urges federal data privacy law. But keep in mind that county Court Clerks and Recorders are going online with records that contain sensitive personal data all over this country.
03/06/07 A story in the HOUSTON CHRONICLE about the TEXAS "online records" mess. (NOTE TO READERS: Records are being put online with SSNs all over this country. What is your County Clerk/Recorder doing? Has your Sec. of State put UCCs online or selling them online? Who is online with YOUR records? )
03/05/07-1415 hrs... 1) COMPUTERWORLD reports about TEXAS and the Clerks' online records with SSNs issue. Texas isn't the only state spoon feeding criminals peoples' SSNs on the records. Some states'/counties' Clerks/Recorders/Registers of Deeds are worse than others about putting the records online complete with SSNs and other personal info. 2) ALSO, DO YOU THINK YOUR PERSONAL HEALTH INFO IS KEPT PRIVATE? 3) More on the TEXAS situation with Court Clerks and SSNs... AND 4) Here's the TEXAS AG's OPINION about the SSNs and online records.
03/05/07 - 1) Hey Arkansas, your state Supreme Court has adopted rules protecting certain information in "court" records , what about those mortgages, deeds, tax liens, etc. (land records) that Recorders in your state are allowing to be sold online. Are SSNs protected in those? Benton, Miller, Polk, & Union's records are being sold online... Click on Arkansas then county names on this link...Cheap price to pay for SSNs. Saline's records are being sold online here. And the Arkansas Secretary of State is selling tens of thousands of UCC (financing statement) records with SSNs on them for a mere $75 per year. What a cheap price to pay for SSNs. Plus they are selling the records in "BULK." AND 2) MORE ON THE TEXAS SITUATION .
03/04/07 - WHEN FIGHTING ID THEFT, BEWARE OF PROCUSTES by Philippe Coueignoux
03/02/07 1) AG's opinion caused chaos in Texas so now Texas lawmakers want to repeal the 2003 law that the AG cited that would protect SSNs (SEE 2/24/07 article links below)... MORE articles on this subject. What are they thinking? 2) CALIFORNIA SECRETARY OF STATE (SOS) IS SELLING SSNs FOR A MERE $5. THEY ARE ON RECORDS (UCCs). SOMETIMES THOSE RECORDS CONTAIN TWO SO THEN A PERSON IS BUYING EACH SSN FOR $2.50. THE "RECORDERS" THERE WILL NOT PUT IMAGES OF RECORDS THEY HOLD ON THE INTERNET, BUT THE SOS IS SPOON FEEDING CRIMINALS BY SHOWING THE IMAGES OF THE FINANCING RECORDS ONLINE. MANY UCCs FROM THE LATE 90'S THRU 2005 CONTAIN SSNs AND SOMETIMES THREE OR FOUR ON ONE DOCUMENT... WHAT IS THIS ELECTED OFFICIAL THINKING BY PUTTING THIS STUFF ONLINE? MAYBE THEY SHOULD DO LIKE NY, VT, NM, OR, AL, AND MO WHICH ALL HAVE TAKEN THE IMAGES OF THE UCCs OFF THE NET. AND AS OF TODAY, FLORIDA STILL HAS SSNs ON THE UCC WEBSITE. ACCORDING TO JAY KASSEES WHO IS IN CHARGE OF THE UCCS, HE HAS PAID THE REDACTION COMPANY IN FULL WHICH WAS SUPPOSED TO HAVE BLACKED OUT ALL THE SSNS. A PHONE CALL TODAY TO HIM BY THE VIRGINIA WATCHDOG PROVED TO HIM THAT THE REDACTION COMPANY FAILED IN THEIR MISSION. PEOPLE ARE STILL AT RISK ALL OVER FLORIDA AS HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF SSNS REMAIN ON MANY CLERKS'/RECORDERS' WEBSITES AS WELL AS THE UCC SEARCH SITE. ALSO IN OSCEOLA COUNTY, FL ONE CAN FIND TONS OF D/L NUMBERS, CAR LICENSE PLATE NUMBERS, DOBS, AND ASSOCIATED NAME AND ADDRESSES. WHAT A WAY TO SPOON FEED CRIMINALS. ARMED WITH THAT INFO ANYONE CAN GO INTO THE FLORIDA DMV SITE AND WREAK HAVOC ON PEOPLE BY CHANGING ADDRESSES, GETTING DUPLICATE D/LS, ETC. THE FLORIDA DMV HAS BEEN TOLD THEIR SYSTEM IS NOT SECURE WITH ALL THE INFORMATION BEING PUT ONLINE BY CLERKS, RECORDERS, AND THE SEC. OF STATE. BUT DMV'S SANDRA LAMBERT AND HER STAFF IN THE D/L DIVISION WON'T LISTEN. THEY NEED TO ADD A PERSONAL IDENTIFICATION NUMBER REQUIREMENT LIKE VIRGINIA DMV DOES... THEY MAIL A PIN OUT WITH A RENEWAL. IN ADDITION TO OTHER INFO THEY ASK FOR, ONE HAS TO BE ABLE TO PROVIDE THAT PIN... NO PIN - THEN NO ACCESS. 3) CREDIT CARD FRAUD & PHISHING... 4) The pilfering of the PUBLIC record - a must read article...
02/26/07 1) New York Times article by Damon Darlin mentions The Virginia Watchdog's founder, BJ Ostergren and was also printed in many other papers across the country. 2) Another article about the Texas online records mess and how the Clerk may be charged for exposing SSNs. Clerks putting records online is occurring all over the country.
02/24/07- County Clerk in Texas slapped by Attorney General ruling - Fort Bend County (Texas) Clerk Dianne Wilson may have violated criminal law by posting Social Security numbers among county records on her office's web site according to an opinion released this week by Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott says Fort bend Herald. And this was the first of a four part series about this clerk... here's the second... here's the third in the series... and here is the fourth part. This online records mess is happening all over this country and while some counties and cities are pulling records down off the internet because of all the personal info in them, Virginia legislators have passed two bills this session which will require ALL Circuit Court Clerks to be online by July 1, 2008. For more about this issue, read this because right now in VA there are 59 Clerks who have certified to the State Compensation Board that they are currently offering the records they hold by "remote access." ANYONE CAN SIGN UP FOR ACCESS. People should be outraged that our legislators are NOT protecting us.
02/16/07 - The Role U.S. Counties May Be Playing in International Deed Fraud
02/12/07 - A must read by Jeff Shapiro in the Richmond Times-Dispatch about the Kilgores of Scott County. Delegate Terry Kilgore is one of the folks who voted for online records. He is also one of five legislators who tried to take away The Virginia Watchdog's First Amendment rights this year in a bill (HB2060 & SB823) that FAILED. Here are examples of public records (his among them) that the VA Gen. Assembly wants available in ANYONE's home... and read about what his twin brother Jerry did in 2003...
02/11/07 - 2000 hrs - USA TODAY "TECH EXPERTS PLOT TO CATCH ID THIEVES" (NOTE TO TVW readers: But keep in mind that state agencies and elected officials like Court Clerks/Registers of Deeds and Secretaries of States are forging ahead (if they are not already online) with putting records on the internet that contain SSNs, mothers' maiden names, minor children's names, DOBs, signatures, and financial acc't numbers and legislators all over the U.S. refuse to stop this runaway train. The Virginia General Assembly is passing two bills this session which will require ALL Circuit Court Clerks to have remote access to public records by July 1, 2008 that are loaded with personal information. To see EXAMPLES OF PUBLIC RECORDS click here. To see how the VA General Assembly also has killed bills this session that would protect SSNs in other records held by agencies like Game & Inland Fisheries, click here.
02/09/07- The Connection Newspaper reports: Social Security [Number] Reform...A bill to protect Social Security numbers will wait for a year, as legislators' numbers go online. (NOTE to TVW readers: The Virginia Watchdog began two years ago to post legislators' and others public records showing their SSNs. There was a move in the VA General Assembly this year to stop BJ Ostergren, but the efforts by Del. Michelle McQuigg, Del. Terry Kilgore, Del. Allen Dudley, Sen. Jeannemarie Devolites-Davis, and Sen. Jay O'Brien FAILED due to the U.S. Constitution and First and Fourteenth Amendment rights. Since they are hell bent on having people's personal information online like DOBs, SSNs, minor children's names, mother's maiden names, and signatures, then theirs will be posted here. More will be added as we get them...)
02/04/07- 1) THE VIRGINIA WATCHDOG claims another success! The New York Sec. of State finally - after over FOUR + years of internet access - has broken links to all "images" of UCC records on that website because hundreds of thousands of them contained SSNs... This AP article about the situation appeared in newspapers all over the country like the Washington Post, Cincinnati Enquirer, Mississippi's Clarion Ledger , and the Times-Picayune (New Orleans), Syracuse, NY Post Standard . 2) "Literally in bed with legislators" - a must read in the Richmond Times-Dispatch today by Jeff Shapiro.
01/31/07 - A reprint of an article from January 14, 2004 about VA Registered Voter lists...
01/29/07 - A call to Donald Trump's office today (and three weeks ago)...
01/28/07 - Personal information posted on government websites spoon-feeds ID thieves - Joe Namath's, Ralph Lauren's, and "The Donald's" SSNs all online in NY State along with a few million others'. Kelly Ripa's and husband's were also online but they had it removed with the help of The Virginia Watchdog... Donald Trump's office was alerted also.
01/27/07 - Update on situation in Vermont about SSNs being online. And this one if that link is broken...
01/25/07 - NBC NIGHTLY NEWS report with video... "Online Public Records Facilitate ID Theft"
01/20/07 Here's a newspaper article about VERMONT Sec. of State and the SSN mess by AP reporter Dave Gram... If that links doesn't work try this newspaper which carried the same article.... OR THIS ONE KEEP IN MIND THAT SSNs WERE VERY EASY TO FIND ON THE SOS' SITE...
01/19/07 - 2000 hrs - BREAKING NEWS! The Virginia Watchdog stirred up Vermont today & yesterday regarding the UCCs online that contained SSNs. Phone calls were made to people who had a SSN on a document. Some great contacts were made and the right people got involved (they know who they are) and helped get that site shut down. A check of the site just now reveals that the Sec. of State there had the good sense to break ALL links to the "images" of ALL records. Summaries do remain but SSNs are protected now. Such a simple solution to just have the summaries online and not the images.
01/19/07 The Virginia Watchdog's founder, BJ Ostergren, is turning Vermont on its ear by alerting people that the Sec. of State there has put people at risk by having UCCs online complete with SSNs and Employer ID numbers. The site needs to be shut down but is stil open at noon today. Story developing...
01/17/07 - As more and more VA Circuit Court Clerks make their records available online, other states' clerks are pulling them down. Read this and this. Other articles below tell of other counties - like Grant County, Indiana -that have pulled the plug. But VA legislators are hell bent on putting people at risk and continues to demand clerks go online.
01/11/07- FINALLY....the General Assembly will at least deal with removing SSNs off court records they're offering online. HB 2062 What's the problem? They're giving the Circuit Court Clerks until 2010 to do so while still allowing the records to be accessed online. They should shut down the sites until Clerks redact SSNs. But what about minor children's names like in Final divorce decrees, DOBs, mother's maiden names , signatures, and financial account numbers? Read this too for a more in depth explanation of this online records mess. DO YOU WANT YOUR PERSONAL (ALBEIT PUBLIC) RECORDS TO BE READ IN ANYONE'S HOME???
01/10/07 - The Ohio Sec. of State still has SSNs on the UCC search site Even though most have been removed, MANY remain! People can't believe it since the former Sec. of State Ken Blackwell's attorneys certified to a Federal court judge that he had removed them all. WRONG!
12/21/06 A must read article about a "Notary." This notary isn't the first one to do something "stupid" and won't be the last. Document fraud and mortgage fraud is a big thing in this country in addition to ID theft...
12/20/06 - Counties work to hide personal data. But redacting documents can be time consuming and expensive says this article in COMPUTERWORLD (Note to readers: Why are our state legislators allowing these records online in the first place with all the SSNs, DOBs, minor children's names, financial account numbers, and mother's maiden names in them. Just make people drive to the courthouse if they want to get into the records. That would save the taxpayers money, too.)
12/13/06 - 1) Richmond Times-Dispatch reports: "The majority of Virginia government agencies are doing an unacceptable job of protecting the huge amounts of sensitive information entrusted to them, according to a state report." (Note: Our Virginia legislators sold us out when they outsourced all state records to a private company, but why should a private company be holding our state tax records, voter registration records, motor vehicle records, etc. not to mention the records that the court clerks hold which have much personal info in them?) 2) CNN reports: Hackers got into UCLA's database of 800,000. 3) Chicago Sun-Times reports: "In a disturbing case of deja vu, 382,000 Boeing Co. retirees and active workers are at risk of identity theft and credit-card fraud because of the theft of a company laptop computer." (Note: Why hack into any website or steal something when Court Clerks/Recorders and Secretaries of State are giving away SSNs on public records?)
12/07/06 - Johnson County, NC posts personal taxpayer info online including SSNS according to a report on WRAL but so what! The North Carolina Sec. of State there has over 675,000 SSNs on her website! Click on "individual and then pick a last name to search for. Keep going until you can click on little yellow file folder to open IMAGE of record.
11/29/06 - The New York City Register of Deeds for Manhattan, Bronx, Queens, and Brooklyn has broken most links to records containing SSNs.
11/27/06 - MISSOURI SECRETARY OF STATE TO FINALLY REMOVE OVER A MILLION SECURITY NUMBERS OFF HER UCC SEARCH SITE (CLICK ON "INDIVIDUAL" AND KEEP GOING UNTIL YOU CAN OPEN THE "IMAGE"BY CLICKING ON THE LITTLE YELLOW FILE FOLDER ICON) . TAKE NOTE THOUGH... SECRETARY ROBIN CARNAHAN BLACKED OUT HERS AND OTHER FAMILY MEMBERS' MONTHS AGO. LOOK UP ROBIN CARNAHAN'S UCC ON HER WEBSITE. SHE PROTECTED HER OWN SSN, HER MOTHER'S AND ANOTHER FAMILY MEMBER'S SSN, BUT LEFT OVER A MILLION OTHER PEOPLE'S SSNS ON THE SITE WHICH IS OPEN TO THE WORLD! IT'S ONLY FAIR WE PRINT THE REAL RECORD. PAGE 1 & PAGE 2. HERE'S HER PHONE NUMBER (573) 751-4936 (Note: Most SSNs are on records from 2000 thru 2004.)
11/17/06 Oklahoma State Court system is spoon feeding criminals all the SSNs they could want...
11/15/06 1100 hrs - 1) WTOP reports about IRS MISSING LAPTOPS... and 2) an article about 51 facing Identity theft charges in the Richmond, VA area. Note: Att. Gen McDonnell was one who voted to put personal (albeit public) records on the internet...Records that are a great source for SSNs, DOBs, mother's maiden names, minor children's names, and signatures.
11/15/06 While other elected officials across the country continue to spoon feed criminals people's SSNs that are on public records, the King County, Washington Council has taken steps to protect SSNs on the King County Recorder's site (note the red writing at the top of that page) where tens and tens of thousands of SSNs used to be all over that site like they still are in many other Washington counties. Why dig in trash, steal mail, or break the law getting SSNs when all anyone has to do is get into a Clerk's, Recorder's, Sec. of State's site and get all the SSNs they could ever want. Heck! Legislators in Virginia even passed a special law allowing these records to be put on the internet. They kowtowed to special interests without giving a second thought to what they were doing... and this is how one woman stirred up a whirlwind of opposition.
11/14/06 RE: HBO's "Hacking Democracy" about electronic voting machines . It was shown again last night and was well worth watching.
11/03/06 November issue of DETAILS magazine (the one with Lance Armstrong on the cover) has an article written by Jenny Hontz called "Does Privacy Exist?" which mentions The Virginia Watchdog. (Print edition only.)
11/01/06 1) HEY, SENATOR GEORGE ALLEN of VA, SAY IT AIN'T SO ! When you were Governor, you signed into law a Virginia General Assembly bill which would allow even Final Divorce Decrees (and other public records) to be gotten via remote access from a Circuit Court Clerk's system complete with children's names, SSNs, grimy details, etc. - all except those sealed by a judge. Now today we find you had your 1983 divorce papers SEALED. Say it ain't so. No one can even see YOUR papers at the courthouse much less on a Court Clerk's website. So while most Virginia citizens' personal business/documents can be gotten on a home computer via remote access, your divorce papers from your first marriage will never see the light of day on a computer. That is really two-faced of you! You protected your own butt while putting everyone else at risk of many crimes. Read this from WSLS about how these records can be seen at the courthouse. Not yours though! You've protected yours and had it sealed, but many Virginians don't even know what a sealed record is and so didn't ask to have theirs sealed but a judge probably wouldn't seal theirs anyway. They have no connections like you had. And why didn't you answer questions about it yesterday... and why didn't you call your staffers off that man? 2) U.S. Senator George Allen as Governor of Virginia in 1997 cooked our goose...and then-Delegate Eric Cantor helped. Neither will get my vote on November 7th.
10/28/06 Link to editorial in The Virginian-Pilot about the NAVY CROSS - the nation's second highest award for bravery...and an endorsement by that same paper
10/26/06 1) OHIO citizens screwed again. Where did Lexis Nexis get those SSNs? Probably bought a voter list somewhere. They should 'fess up about their source and tell people who can get access to their site. They make it sound safe... But Lexis Nexis has more states' SSNs than just OHIO's which they are selling just like CHOICEPOINT. They are both data brokers. But them selling them is nothing compared to the state agencies and elected officials who are making images of public records available via the internet. Many County Recorders, Circuit Court Clerks, and Secretaries of States all over the U.S. have online access to SSNs. In those records there are SSNs galore plus other personal info. For example, in that Times-Reporter article it says the OHIO Sec. of State had published 1.2 million on his website for "UCC searches." Well, there are still THOUSANDS there even though a judge ordered the SOS to purge his system of them back in March. What's being done about that? Missouri, Florida, NC Secretaries of State are spoon feeding criminals too to name just three. 2) Hey, ILLINOIS citizens, over 1 million of your SSNs were exposed too Someone's head should roll.
10/24/06 Do away with Circuit Court Clerks? That's what a Supreme Court committee has decided. Keep in mind that these clerks - yes, the same ones who pushed to make YOUR personal - albeit public - records available on the internet - also usually get additional bonuses from Boards of Supervisors on top of their salary from the Virginia State Compensation Board. The committee's proposal to do away with Circuit Court Clerks will never fly, but what be better would be to reduce their terms to four years since they are the only elected official in VA who have eight year terms. People should read some of their audits done by the APA. Here's an article about how they wanted raises even though many get bad audits with links to the audits. (Note: they ended up not getting their way with the raises.) Also... every "county's" Circuit Court Clerk will be up for election in 2007. They should be voted out of office for pushing this online records mess.
10/23/06 MISSISSIPPI SECRETARY OF STATE HAS PUT UCCs BACK ONLINE WITH SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBERS
10/21/06 Ken Blackwell, the present Ohio Sec. of State who is running for Governor (election next month) still has thousands of SSNs on his UCC website. A check of his site on Friday (09/20/06) of just 12 random records viewed by the founder of The Virginia Watchdog yielded SSNs on half of those records. Why are they still there when a federal court judge ordered him to get those SSNs off that website??? AND Greg Hartmann of Hamilton County is running for Blackwell's job but even though he has pulled down many hundreds of thousands of records containing SSNs off his own website, is he in the process of making arrangements to redact/black out the SSNs and throw the records back online showing people's home addresses, signatures, etc. on them? Oh, yes, that's what we hear... You OHIANS should wake up!
10/20/06 THE WEB HAS BECOME A PERSONAL INFO FREE-FOR-ALL This article doesn't even touch on state agencies spoon feeding criminals people's SSNs, DOBS, mother's maiden names, minor children's names, signatures, or financial account numbers... so read this.
10/12/06 The Register of Deeds in many North Carolina counties - like many others across the country - are spoon feeding criminals and putting POLICEMEN and others at risk by putting records online. Now it's an election issue in Rowan County, NC where to search records is open to the world - just like in Mecklenburg County, NC. Here's NC's law about removing certain pieces of info off official public records on the internet that went into effect 12/01/05, but 99% of NC's citizens have no clue their life/info/records are even on the internet. Plus the North Carolina Sec. of State is spoon feeding people's SSNs to the world on this search site- like this "example" of a record with a SSN and there are over 675,000 other SSNs on that site alone. (Note to readers: THE NC SOS blacked out Troxell's SSN on her website over a year and a half ago, but left everyone else's on the UCCs. She should have protected EVERYONE and not just her "friend.") Here is an article about the NC SOS' website and the mess about the SSNs.... and here are more examples of public records found across the country available via the internet.
10/01/06 QUESTION: What is happening all over this country? ANSWER: Elected officials putting records online that they are supposed to be protecting which have SSNs, DOBs, children's names, financial account numbers, signatures, medical information, and mother's maiden names in them like final divorce decrees, powers of attoeny, guardianship papers, deeds, mortgages, etc. But here's one Recorder who just shut her site down recently - Grant County, Indiana's DIXIE CONNOR who did the right thing and does not have "images" of documents online anymore unlike MARION (Indianapolis), WAYNE, FRANKLIN, LAPORTE, & ST. JOSEPH who are offering public records online WITH SSNs and other info on them. And the Indiana Secretary of State, Todd Rokita, is also selling public records called UCCs with SSNs on them for $4.08 per record and some records contain TWO of them. That is a cheap price to pay for two SSNs.... AND here's a link to an article from this past January about how public records are linked to crime.
09/28/06 1) Hey OHIO voters! GO to www.truthaboutgreghartmann.com Haven't you had enough stupid people who have put your SSNs online as Sec. of State there? Read about one guy running for Sec. of State - Clerk of Court Greg Hartmann - who finally did pull records off his Clerk's website, but it was too little too late. People had already been victimized by ID thieves. And why would you want Ken Blackwell as Governor? He spoon fed criminals, too, and had to be sued to get SSNs off his site, but there are many still on his site. Many states' county Clerks or Recorders have made records available online that contain SSNs! Ohio is not alone... 2) USA TODAY article by Jon Swartz about "several avenging angels" nationwide looking out for ID theft victims. (Note to readers: It is mentioned in that story that BJ Ostergren has "uncovered" 18,000 SSNs. The fact is she has found literally MILLIONS of them on Clerks', Recorders'/Register of Deeds', or Sec. of States' search sites, but has only printed out or downloaded 18,000+ and adds to the amount almost daily.)
09/19/06 - ROANOKE (VA) TIMES editorial worth reading about phone records being sold....
09/18/06 OHIO'S SECRETARY OF STATE, KEN BLACKWELL, CONTINUES TO SPOON FEED CRIMINALS ON HIS UCC SEARCH SITE, but yet he still wants to be Governor. The Virginia Watchdog, who opened this can of worms back in March, has told the plaintiff's attorney, Chris Jenkins, way back in the summer and as recently as August that the Secretary's office had done a VERY poor job of removing the SSNs even though Blackwell's lawyers told the judge the job was complete months ago. TVW continues to find SSNs on his search site and believes there are more than 10,000 SSNs still on that site. Would you like for yours to be one of them? But Blackwell isn't the only Sec. of State who is putting people's SSNs at risk....NY, FL, NC, and others have put records online with SSNs...plus Recorders and Clerks of Court have done the same thing in MANY states' counties.
09/07/06 And where did this guy in this Washington Post story get the SSNs they sold on fake IDs? One treasure trove would be a Clerk of Court's/Recorder's remote access site where there are literally millions of SSNs for the taking plus other personal info and children's names. But legislators all over the U.S want those records online. Records with personal info are going online all over this country...or are already online!
08/30/06 Does any legislator in this country still THINK there is such a thing as a secure website? Clerks of court are allowing records to be accessed via the internet from websites. With all the hackings, one would think that we would keep records with personal info offline...Here are the latest stories. A Reuters column about AT&T being hacked... and this one involving the info of 21,000 student loan borrowers and this one about laptops stolen from Education contractor
08/27/06 1) Miami Herald article today by Monica Hatcher "PUBLIC RECORDS ARE EASY TARGET FOR ID THIEVES" quotes The Virginia Watchdog's BJ Ostergren. 2)