Newsgroups: soc.roots
Date:         Thu, 31 Dec 1992 15:17:47 PST
Reply-To:     Tom Lincoln <lincoln@IRIS.RAND.ORG>
From:         Tom Lincoln <lincoln@IRIS.RAND.ORG>
Subject:      Genealogy and personal information...
Comments: To: Roots-L@vm1.nodak.edu

WE spend a great deal of time trying to tease out information about
relatives long dead. Here is a posting from RISKS FORUM DIGEST about how
easy it is today to get data on the living...

Date: Wed, 23 Dec 92 12:28:17 EST
From: Brian Seborg <seborg@first.org>
Subject: What about "little brother?"

In the past we have tried to control information collected by "Big
Brother" or the Federal Government.  I believe that this has for the most
part been accomplished.  What has not been done, and what seriously needs
to be addressed is the collection and dissemination of information by
numerous "Little Brothers." Specifically, additional guidance is needed to
protect information maintained by credit reporting agencies, State
Government agencies, retail stores, and other entities which routinely
collect information that can be linked to an individual by name or other
unique identifier.

Since I teach a computer security class at a local college, the issue of
privacy seems even more important once you know how many ways the
information can be compromised.  After a lecture on privacy one of my
students mentioned that he worked with some private investigators, and he
mentioned that they routinely had access to all kinds of information on
people, and that agencies such as the state department of motor vehicles
routinely sold access to their records to just about anyone.

To illustrate the problem I asked the student to initiate an inquiry and
to see what he could find out with only my name as information.  The next
class he brought me the results of his spending about 30 minutes at a
computer terminal.  Here is a partial list of what he provided me in
printed form: my current address, the addresses of all my previous
residences, a list of all of the automobiles I have ever owned, my social
security number, my drivers license number, a list of all of the credit
cards I have ever owned including cancelled cards, their credit limits,
the credit card numbers, and the current balance, the name and address of
my employer, my father and brother's name and address, the name of my
wife, the name address and phone numbers of all of my neighbors, their
date of residence, and the type of home they had, my criminal record
(blank) along with any pending cases, my traffic record (not blank
unfortunately! :-)), my race, my income, the amount of my mortgage, my
credit rating, etc.  I imagine that most people have no idea that such
information about them is so easily accessible.  Imagine the potential for
coming up with a detailed profile of a person once you begin associating
individuals to the groceries they buy if the current trend of using check
cashing cards or bank-cards to pay for groceries really catches on!  For
example, could you imagine who might want to have access to lists of
customers which bought specific products?  Giant supermarkets (a large
chain in our area) already has the computer printing out coupons based on
the purchases you have made, what would they do with this information if
they could associate you with the groceries you bought?  One could imagine
the following phone call after purchasing a bladder control product: "Yes,
Mr.  Seborg, this is the office of Dr.  Nosey, Urologist, we are offering
five dollars off your initial consultation, when can we schedule you for
your first appointment?" Or worse, you could have someone inferring some
personal profile based on your patterns of consumption.  Far fetched,
maybe, but I bet you may think before you use that bank card, or check
cashing card next time at the grocery store, eh?

Brian Seborg, VDS Advanced Research Group  seborg@csrc.ncsl.nist.gov

From:
RISKS-FORUM Digest  Thurs 31 December 1992  Volume 14 : Issue 20

Happy New Year!