No response from ChoicePoint yet regarding my e-mail to them, but they have released a statement indicating at least 110,000 individuals outside of California are affected by the security compromise, and at least 750 confirmed cases of identity theft can already be linked to this incident.
Nice going, Big Brother.
An interesting tidbit from the statement:
This incident was not a breach of ChoicePoint’s
network or a “hacking” incident and did not involve any of
ChoicePoint’s customer information. Nevertheless, this is a serious issue which ChoicePoint is addressing aggressively.
Oh, really? Every news organization reporting on this disagrees. And a suspect has already been arrested.
So if this wasn’t a “hacking” incident, then was was it? If ChoicePoint
has no culpability; if its network is so secure, then why is
ChoicePoint making the notification to fraud victims, instead of the
truly responsible party? Finally, why is ChoicePoint addressing the
issue “aggressively” if it shares no blame?