4/13/2005

LexisNexis In Even Bigger Trouble

Well, the loosely regulated commercial data-brokering business, Lexis Nexis, finds itself in more trouble than what it probably expected when the beans spilled on Wednesday. It turns out that they might have exposed the personal information of three times the customers than what they initially reported. The personal information of thousands, even hundreds of thousands of Americans have been put at risk with the string of recent breaches by leading data broker companies, namely LexisNexis and ChoicePoint Inc.. They sincerely apologized and regret what happened but that doesn't change the past. A good portion of the Senate have introduced legislation including requirements that consumers are to be notified when their personal information is breached. For the present time, only California has this provision. The senators promised a crackdown on this so I think it would be a great idea if all the other states would hurry up and follow in the footsteps of California.

1 comment:

Dr. Tufte said...

The tradeoff here is much like what a parent faces with a small child. You want them to reveal the truth (even if it is harmful to them), but you also want to enforce good behavior. Requiring that they report breaches doesn't seem like it goes too far towards giving them an incentive to keep breaches secret.