Couldn't happen to a more deserving target

It seems that ChoicePoint - or at least some of its executives - may be in for a little trouble, or so says Computerworld for March 4:

Two top executives at credit and personal information vendor ChoicePoint Inc. are being investigated by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for possible stock trading irregularities in connection with the company's recent disclosures that it sold the personal information of thousands of consumers to fraudulent businesses. ...

ChoicePoint said the SEC is conducting an "informal inquiry" into recent stock trading by the company's CEO, Derek Smith, and its president and chief operating officer, Douglas Curling.

The company insists that these were prearranged sales that are "typical" for senior executives of public companies - but the sales took place after the company learned of the breach of its apparently slipshod security procedures and before the public was notified.

Then again, maybe that is in fact "typical."

Footnote One: ChoicePoint has announced that it will no longer sell "sensitive" consumer information to businesses except for things directly related to consumer business (such as car loans) or for government security inquiries. They are now informing users that because of "recent issues," they are requiring updates of account information and restricting access to some data.

Some Social Security numbers, Drivers License numbers and birth dates have been truncated (only part of the number will display) on reports or searches.

In addition to provoking images of horses and barn doors, it's more than reasonable to suggest that ChoicePoint, noted as one of the most aggressive lobbyists against restrictions on the data pimp industry, is taking this "voluntary" step to head off the rising cry for regulation. As Harry noted in a comment on Sunday, there really is no reason for so much information about our personal lives to be in one place. But until we come to our senses - assuming we do in time to protect what of our privacy remains - strict limits on the use, dissemination and most importantly the gathering of personal information must be, must be, established and then carefully and tightly enforced.

Footnote Two: On another happy note, the Bank of America is really very sorry for "losing" computer tapes containing personal data of 1.2 million federal employees.

[S]omeone looking for updated information on the Bank of America website would be advised to exercise great patience in trying to even find mention of the incident at all - nothing about it is available on the home page. Or a secondary page for that matter. ...

In its only press release buried numerous levels into its website, the very first sentence speaks volumes of the care, concern and accountability Bank of America is taking regarding the loss of customers' personal information.

"Bank of America today confirmed that a small number of computer data tapes were lost during shipment to a backup data center."

See, just a minor incident, hardly worth noticing, and it affected only a "small" number of people. After all, what's a number equal to the population of a major city? Miniscule!

But they really are very sorry:

From Ken Lewis – now entering his fifth year as chief executive of Bank of America: "I felt awful for our customers ... Even though information was not compromised, that obviously creates anxiety."

So you see, no problem, no difficulty, just a "small" number affected, but by gosh, they feel your pai - uh, your anxiety. So I guess that makes everything okay.