The Virginia Watchdog

THE VIRGINIA WATCHDOG

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.

Since August 2002, BJ Ostergren has been advocating for states either to shut down their sites which are loaded with SSNs or get the SSNs off the records. Many people have listened and made an effort to protect SSNs, but Virginia did not. The legislature of Virginia taking a different road created a law during the 2008 session that said "Do as I say...not as I do" which was directed right at Ostergren and this website in an effort to silence her. They didn't like it that she published many records belonging to legislators and others which showed SSNs. She was only doing what they were doing.

In a March 15th, 2008 AP article about the new law, Dena Potter wrote, "Even the lawmaker behind the bill acknowledged that stopping people like Ostergren from publishing the Social Security numbers - not protecting Virginians from identity theft - was the goal of the legislation." The patron of the Senate bill was Senator Edd Houck (D) and the patron of the House bill was Del. Joe May (R). During the House floor debate, Del. Joe May stood up and said "there is a woman putting SSNs on a website" and said it must be stopped. He didn't say that the Clerks are doing the same thing. Both bills passed unanimously and not one person stood up for First Amendment rights. (More coming on that in the future...)

Instead of the lawmakers dealing with all the personal info in those records like SSNs, they directed their "venom" at BJ Ostergren and created the law which is at the center of litigation in Federal Court. The solution could have been so simple in how the legislature dealt with SSNs in the public records - just shut down all websites until 100% of the SSNs were removed. But the legislators didn't do that and they also didn't even bother to fund a redaction program in 2007 which would have cost an estimated $8 million dollars and would have required the Clerks to remove all SSNs by July 1, 2010. Read the "fiscal impact" statement linked here in a 2007 bill where it states that the money was not appropriated and so the July1, 2010 date was eliminated (see second paragraph in # 8). Also literally millions of dollars have been spent on getting the records available via remote access, but like in Hanover which spent several hundred thousand dollars, there are only 13 users of the remote system.

* To all Virginia citizens past and present - As of July 1, all Virginia Circuit Court Clerks now have remote access to deeds, mortgages, tax liens, name change documents, Powers of Attorney, Wills plus other probate records (complete with bank account numbers), judgments, etc. All of these records contain a lot of personal information. Anyone can sign up to gain access to the records which contain SSNs, DOBs, mother's maiden names, minor children's names, financial account numbers, and signatures. The citizens of VA have paid for the records to be put online once through fees collected by the Clerks, but you will have to pay a fee again to get access to the remote access systems. That in itself is discriminatory since if you don't have $$$, you cannot gain access to records required by law to be open to everyone. You will have to drive to a courthouse to see records that others are looking at from their homes or offices. (Another case of the "haves" winning and the "have nots" losing out.) And even the "Feds" created records with SSNs on them which are available on the World Wide Web.

Some Clerks claim they have blacked out the SSNs.

Hanover County's Circuit Court Clerk, Frank Hargrove, Jr, was one of the Clerks named in an affidavit sworn to by the Clerks' Association lobbyist saying that they had already blacked out or redacted the SSNs from the records online. The lobbyist gave a sworn affidavit on behalf of the VA AG in the court case linked above. The only problem is that the Hanover Circuit Court Clerk had NOT blacked out all SSNs and this was proven by this site's founder, editor and publisher on July 15th when she accessed his remote access site and found several SSNs in just a matter of minutes. The Clerk in a telecon with Mrs. Ostergren on July 16th told her he knew he had missed some SSNs, but a search of his own personal records on his site showed his and his wife's SSNs had been protected by being blacked out on a Deed of Trust. So had his brother's and his wife's on two other documents been blacked out. And so had his father's legislative aide's and his wife's also on a Deed of Trust been protected.

* To all United States citizens - many counties and states in the U.S.A have done the same thing as mentioned above - except in most other states the websites are open and free to anyone anywhere in the world. Yes, the records are public, in general circulation, and easy to obtain lawfully. No need to dumpster dive or break any laws to find SSNs because government agencies are spoon feeding this information to everyone.

Take for example the state of Maryland. There are three websites in that state hosted by government agencies which are loaded with SSNs and apparently no one there in power will do anything about the hemorrhaging of SSNs on those sites. Phone calls have been made to people about this problem and news stories have been written. The records are for free in that state and the three sites are linked here and here and here. In the third link, click on the county you want then look for this link - "Search County Land Record Indices, Jan. 3, 1977 - Aug 22, 2008 (verified through Aug 21, 2008)."

The answer we get when we call people who either are a legislator or keeper of the records is that they are public records and they will remain online complete with the SSNs - except in one case. On this link, the current Maryland Attorney General had his SSN blacked out while thousands of others remain - including Maryland legislators'. Here is a Washington Post story about Maryland.

The Virginia Watchdog's founder has downloaded many SSNs off this site. Other states are just as bad as Maryland and they don't seem to "get it" when it comes to protecting SSNs. If the government wants to spoon feed SSNs to the world, they are doing a great job of it and have been for years.

* Read about and email Betty "BJ" Ostergren, Founder/Editor/Publisher of The Virginia Watchdog

* Hot links including this new one..."Patient Privacy Rights" which deals with electronic medical records (a bad idea)

* Here are links to some various Secretary of States' UCC "Search" sites. (UCCs are "financing" statements.)