From Reuters, 2/23/05:
http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=businessNews&storyID=2005-02-23T172648Z_01_N23621931_RTRIDST_0_BUSINESS-FINANCIAL-CHOICEPOINT-DC.XML
ChoicePoint Sued Over Identity Theft
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) -
A California woman has sued ChoicePoint Inc. for fraud and negligence
after criminals gained access to a database of personal records
compiled by the company.
The suit, which seeks class-action status, was filed in Los Angeles
Superior Court last Friday and claims that for at least five months
the company failed to adequately protect people's financial records
and confidential information.
A ChoicePoint spokesman was not immediately available to comment.
ChoicePoint has acknowledged that tens of thousands of consumer
records were improperly accessed, and the Los Angeles County Sheriff's
Department has made at least one arrest.
ChoicePoint maintains a database of information, including bank and
criminal data, on virtually ever U.S. consumer. That information is
sold to government agencies, prospective lenders and others.
The identity thieves were able to access Social Security numbers,
credit histories, criminal records and other sensitive data,
ChoicePoint has said.
The suit seeks to represent anyone whose personal records were
maintained by ChoicePoint from October 2004 through the completion of
the suit, regardless of whether or not that data was actually released
to anyone.
It also claims that prospective class members, possibly numbering at
least 145,000 in total, have suffered damages of less than $75,000
each.
_______________________________________________________________
http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,949696,00.html
"The controversy is not the first to engulf ChoicePoint. The company's
subsidiary, Database Technologies, was responsible for bungling an
overhaul of Florida's voter registration records, with the result that
thousands of people, disproportionately black, were disenfranchised in
the 2000 election. Had they been able to vote, they might have swung
the state, and thus the presidency, for Al Gore, who lost in Florida
by a few hundred votes."
From The Amarillo Globe-News, 12/21/00:
http://www.amarillonet.com/stories/122100/opi_guestcolumn.shtml
Others were knocked off the rolls because they were listed as felons,
even though they were not.
Some of this has been traced to the company ChoicePoint, which came up
with the "scrub list" of felons, dead people and other ineligible
voters.
In one county, voting officials determined that 15 percent of the
"felons" were actually eligible to vote.
In many counties, though, voting officials did nothing to verify the
list, potentially disenfranchising thousands of voters.
ChoicePoint even identified a local judge as a felon.
Coincidentally or not, the ChoicePoint board is packed with Republican
partisans and fund-raisers.
Before his death, ChoicePoint's founder, Rick Rozar, donated $100,000
to the Republican Party.
Harry
.
|
