Choice Point seeking all CA DMV records

[rumpel]

This brings up a big question of Government contracts with private companies in general.

Michael Hiltzik:
Big Data Broker Eyes DMV Records
It's axiomatic that to get ahead in business, you have to possess a quality known through the ages as moxie or chutzpah. No one would ever accuse ChoicePoint Inc. of having that quality in short supply.

ChoicePoint is the Georgia-based data broker that has fessed up to having divulged the personal records of at least 162,000 individuals to a gang of Los Angeles identity thieves. Following its initial public disclosure of the breach in February, the company tried to portray itself as the victim in the case, even though its own sloppy procedures led to the information release and the real risk of financial loss was borne by the innocent people whose credit ratings and privacy had been compromised. (A Nigerian national who cadged the data from ChoicePoint, apparently with ridiculous ease, later pleaded guilty to criminal charges.)

snip

ChoicePoint says it requested the DMV records for a client, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. That suggests it may ask the state to waive the normal fee of 10 cents per record, or about $3 million. By state law, government agencies can access DMV records for free.

But the money is a secondary consideration. The primary issue for the DMV has to be this: Given ChoicePoint's history, should it be allowed anywhere near our motor vehicle records?

snip

The company's handling of motor vehicle records hasn't inspired confidence, either. In 2000, Pennsylvania terminated ChoicePoint's access to its drivers' license records and fined the company nearly $1.4 million because some records had been sold to unauthorized purchasers. ChoicePoint, characteristically, blamed one of its own customers for violating its rules. Pennsylvania authorities reinstated the contract a year later, with stringent conditions, because the company so dominated the business of providing motorist data to insurance companies that the insurers could barely function without it.

snip

Its real purpose in seeking the records remains murky. ChoicePoint refused to discuss its negotiations, other than to confirm that its client is the Department of Homeland Security. Staff members there were unable to identify the relevant contract for me. Then ChoicePoint, which holds about $50 million in contracts from a wide range of federal agencies, acknowledged that although Homeland Security was seeking the California records, it wasn't actually the contracting agency. Instead, it was utilizing an umbrella contract through which ChoicePoint services something called FedLink. This seems to be an information access program for the government, operated by the Library of Congress.

Wohlford wouldn't agree to my request for an interview. People in the know say that she is as determined a guardian of DMV records as you could wish for, so it's possible that these discussions are in firm hands.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-golden1dec01,1,5636035.column?coll=la-headlines-business

[tularetom]

1. Is there anything in there about political contributions?

Without knowing anything about it other than what I read in the post my guess is they gave gobs of cash to * and other repuke candidates.

[rumpel]

4. Some info from Electronic Privacy Information Network

http://www.epic.org/privacy/choicepoint/#documents

includes FOIA requests

[Al-CIAda]

2. Greg Palast has written extensively about the evil incarnate that is

"ChoicePoint".

[MsUnderstood]

3. Spouse and I went to get car insurance

And I believe it was choicepoint that the insurance agent used to look at our driving record. No not the record from the DMV but the record the insurance had about our driving history.

Anytime you report an accident to your insurance, the insurance sends that information to Choice point and it is put in a database. Then when you go to get insurance, the agency runs a check to see what claims you have made.

Oh and tried to get a bank account lately? Many years ago, I had a situation where a false deposit with a bad check was made on my account. The deposit check bounced, my account was all messed up and I closed it, filing a report of fraud.

2 years later, I tried to get a bank account and the bank ran choicepoint then refused me an account because of that situation. Just like with credit, I filed a dispute with Choicepoint who chekced with the bank, which had been sold/merged/closed but were somehow able to verify I had a bad account but not that it was frauld so the ding remained.

Choicepoint is the worst thing to happen to America and privacy. Forget about the government having all your information--go to choicepoint.com and see the data they have on you!

[zbdent]

5. How much you wanna bet there will be several million

"near misses" on the voter rolls in 06 which cause disenfranchisement, leading to strange "landslide victories" in Kalifornia for Repukes?