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ChoicePoint Identity Theft Fallout Widens

Posted by Zonk on from the southern-california-elderly-man-buys-xbox dept.

dstates writes "A unique California law forced ChoicePoint to reveal that a break-in had compromised accounts revealing personal information on 40,000 southern californians and leading to more than 750 cases of identity theft. The company initially denied that the break-in compromised consumers outside of California, but CNN is now reporting that 110,000 accounts nationally have been compromised. 'The irony appears to be that ChoicePoint has not done its own due diligence in verifying the identities of those 'businesses' that apply to be customers,' said Beth Givens, director of the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse. 'They're not doing the very thing they claim their service enables their customers to achieve.'"

2 of 297 comments (clear)

  1. Trust us! by Thud457 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    How does someone determine if Choicepoint had data on them?

    --

    the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

  2. Re:This Company is Corrupt by KingSkippus · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Here is a reference to an article on CNN about this. Also, check out the article in the St. Petersburg Times. Last, but not least, check out this article in The Guardian. My favorite quote from the last article: "The controversy [regarding the Bush DoJ paying ChoicePoint $11 million for names, addresses, occupations, DoB, passport numbers, "physical descriptions," tax records, and blood groups of Latin Americans] is not the first to engulf ChoicePoint." Nor, apparently, the last. This was written on May 5, 2003, over a year before this fiasco. How many chances should one company get before they're shut down?

    So yeah, this company scares the shit out of me, as does its parent, Equifax. Personal opinion o' me is that they all need to be immediately shut down. If you don't like YOUR personal information being given to anyone with a few bucks, PLEASE write to your government representatives and demand that something real be done NOW to protect our privacy!

    P. S. I live about 10 minutes away from Alpharetta, GA, where this company is located. I'm thinking of posting a link to where you can donate pitchforks and torches...