Since the data breach by ChoicePoint six years ago, regulators, businesses and consumers have increased their awareness and reaction to organizations that mishandle sensitive consumer data.
In early 2005, California was the only state that had a breach notification law. ChoicePoint allowed information on approximately 150,000 consumers to be accessed fraudulently. When ChoicePoint only notified California victims of the breach, a precursor to identity theft, both victims and regulators reacted.
Since 2005, 46 states and three territories have enacted data breach laws. Only Alabama, Kentucky, New Mexico and South Dakota are left. Each state law is different, making compliance difficult for any organization that has security a security breach in which the victims reside in multiple states.
Since the CheckPoint incident, over a half-billion profiles have been compromised in 2,500 reported incidents. Some Americans have been victimized by security breaches multiple times, for example, by their schools, local, state or federal government, a retailer, financial institution or their favorite charity. Some organizations have suffered numerous breaches.
Of the 2,500 reported breaches, one third of the reporting organizations could not quantify how much information was accessed, lost, stolen or improperly disposed.
The most frightening statistics are a bit more general. Most organizations haven’t inventoried the consumer information they possess, and they don’t have a method in place to detect a breach. Others report that their employees don’t report breaches because they fear retribution by consumers and regulators.
It pays for consumers to take action to protect themselves with a service such as LifeLock.
LifeLock is the only proactive identity protection service on the market today. As a LifeLock customer, you will be notified the moment any threat to your personal information, whether credit related or not, is detected. This, in effect, stops identity theft in its tracks, and makes any information a thief could acquire during a data breach useless.
Call LifeLock today. Receive 30 days free and get a 10 percent discount on enrollment with the LifeLock Promo Code “Defense.”
