Privacy Digest

Computer heist puts voter IDs in dange - Via Nashville, Tennessee - Tennessean.com :

The names, addresses and complete Social Security numbers of more than 337,000 Davidson County voters may be in the hands of thieves, Metro election officials said Friday.

The information could be used by identity thieves. County election officials are warning the public to monitor their credit accounts for any suspicious activity.

Election officials had said earlier in the week that the computers stolen over the Christmas holiday from the Metro Election Commission offices at Howard School Building, 800 Second Ave. S., contained voters' partial Social Security numbers, along with other personal information.

"As we looked deeper … we now know that full Social Security numbers were included on the voter files contained on one or more of the stolen computers," county Election Administrator Ray Barrett said.

Initially, Metro thought the information on the missing computers was the same as that found in the databases that political candidates can purchase from the county to create mailing lists to potential voters. "We now know that was incorrect," Barrett said.

The thieves also apparently broke into neighboring Metro offices in the Howard building, although a full tally of the damage was not yet available Friday afternoon.

Voters will be alerted

The Election Commission will send a written notice to all voters in Davidson County, alerting them to the potential danger of identity theft, within the next week.

The laptops were loaded with voter information in preparation for the upcoming Feb. 5 presidential primary elections, when they would have been stationed in polling places to confirm voters' identities. Barrett said he had asked Metro's information technology staff to work with his office to help safeguard voter data against future security breaches.

(Read Original Article - Via Nashville, Tennessee - Saturday, 12/29/07 - Tennessean.com.)