Connections

Only in the world of blogs could this happen. 

Yesterday I received an email from blogless friend Sue reading in part:

Have you heard anything in the news about people with MA licenses (I'm thinking professional not driving) having had a security breach? I swear I saw a crawl on yesterday's news but can't find a story anywhere...

No, I hadn't heard anything and I went poking around a bit.  Didn't find anything, but that's because even with searches - it does matter what you're searching for!

This morning I was making my usual perusal of Instapundit and came across this post.  It led me to a post by Giacomo, who linked to a post by Jay Tea, who linked to a Boston Globe story.

And thus I found the information Sue was looking for. 

I also ended up with this question...

If you are required by law to have a professional license to conduct your business, why can't you opt out of having your information sold to marketers?

The division normally copies disks for various marketing agencies that request the information under the state's public records law, Jones said.

I thought the public records aspect of things was so the public could check on licenses to be sure the person who says they have a license... actually has one. I can see that marketers have used the availability of this information in order to boost their mailing lists.  Oh goody. 

Once again - the law of unintended consequences kicks in.  But the state doesn't care. They get money from the people having to get the licenses.  Then they get money from the people buying the addresses.  It's a win-win for everyone but the licensee who ends up getting the shaft all the way around.

This is also bothersome:

Officials said the last two disks, which contain the information of 16,000 licensed professionals, are still in the mail.

Wonderful, so now there are a couple of disks still floating about... what if they aren't recovered.  What happens then?  Do you think the state of Massachusetts is  going to even bother to notify the people involved?  How about compensate them for having to lock down their accounts and keep an eye on them for the next 10 years?

No.  I don't think they'll do anything at all, especially as it doesn't profit the government in any way. 

Posted by: Teresa in Weblogs at 12:41 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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