ResourceBlog Article: Consumer Data Broker ChoicePoint Failed to Protect Consumers' Personal Data, Left Key Electronic Monitoring Tool Turned Off for Four Months

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Tuesday, 20th October 2009

Consumer Data Broker ChoicePoint Failed to Protect Consumers' Personal Data, Left Key Electronic Monitoring Tool Turned Off for Four Months

ChoicePoint, Inc., one of the nation’s largest data brokers, has agreed to strengthened data security requirements to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that the company failed to implement a comprehensive information security program protecting consumers’ sensitive information, as required by a previous court order. This failure left the door open to a data breach in 2008 that compromised the personal information of 13,750 people and put them at risk of identify theft. ChoicePoint has now agreed to a modified court order that expands its data security assessment and reporting duties and requires the company to pay $275,000.

In April 2008, ChoicePoint (now a subsidiary of Reed Elsevier, Inc.) turned off a key electronic security tool used to monitor access to one of its databases, and for four months failed to detect that the security tool was off, according to the FTC. During that period, an unknown person conducted unauthorized searches of a ChoicePoint database containing sensitive consumer information, including Social Security numbers. The searches continued for 30 days. After discovering the breach, the company brought the matter to the FTC’s attention.

The FTC alleged that if the security software tool had been working, ChoicePoint likely would have detected the intrusions much earlier and minimized the extent of the breach. The FTC also alleged that ChoicePoint’s conduct violated a 2006 court order mandating that the company institute a comprehensive information security program reasonably designed to protect consumers’ sensitive personal information.

+ United States of America (for the Federal Trade Commission) v. ChoicePoint Inc.

Source: Federal Trade Commission

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