[Dataloss] 13000 SSN posted on internet in LA

[Henry Brown]

http://www.nola.com/news/t-p/capital/index.ssf?/base//news-6/1219902067300440.xml&coll=1

BATON ROUGE -- A glitch during a computer upgrade at the Louisiana Real 
Estate Commission caused the names, addresses and Social Security 
numbers of more than 13,000 licensed agents to be exposed on the 
Internet last week, sending waves of concern through the real estate 
community statewide.

 The commission, which is a state regulatory agency that oversees the 
licensing of all real estate agents and brokers, discovered the problem 
Friday after the confidential information had been accessible on the 
Internet for about two days, Executive Director J.C. Willie said.

"Are we concerned? I guess we got to be," said Mark Rodi, president of 
Louisiana Realtors, a private industry group. "But you can't get upset 
about what you can't control."

[...]

The insurer in years past had required that all the agents be identified 
by their Social Security numbers. That form of agent ID is no longer 
used by the commission or the insurance carrier. But the commission had 
kept the old list with the Social Security numbers in its computer 
files, Willie said.

 "It was an unfortunate occurrence, but it was handled immediately upon 
discovery," said Commission Chairwoman Gretchen Ezernack, a Monroe Realtor.

The commission contacted the Internet search engine companies Google and 
Yahoo to ensure that the pages were not being retained by their systems, 
Willie said.

Willie said it would be hard to pinpoint exactly who left the file 
exposed and that he expected there would be no consequences for whoever 
might be to blame.

Rodi and Louisiana Realtors Chief Executive Malcolm Young said they were 
satisfied that the commission was doing all it could to address the 
problem.