* The ITAA's six-point strategy for fighting identity theft
In the past two months, Bank of America, Boston College, ChoicePoint and Lexis/Nexis all announced incidents in which customer data was lost or compromised, and these are just the privacy breaches that we know about. Concerned about the scourge of identity theft, the government stepped in and created new rules for banks to address such incidents (see https://www.nwfusion.com/news/2005/032805-identity-theft.html).
However, this is just the first step in securing networks and protecting the privacy of consumer data. The Information Technology Association of America (ITAA) is calling for more law enforcement action and cooperation among the industry to fight data breaches.
“We call on all stakeholders to work together to address this growing problem in a manner that meets and even exceeds society’s privacy and security expectations while preserving the efficiency and productivity of electronic records,” says Harris Miller, ITAA president. “Custodians of data, government and individuals all have a share of the responsibility in protecting personally identifiable information and other sensitive data and assuring its appropriate use.”
The ITAA’s six-point strategy focuses on improving law enforcement powers and capabilities to focus on the lawbreakers, reducing the number of breaches, and notifying victims in the event personal data are improperly disclosed or obtained.
Here are the elements of the plan:
* A reasonable and effective national breach notification law applicable to credit reporting agencies as well as other data custodians.
* A national law enforcement strategy that reinforces prosecutors’ tools and increases penalties for individuals who engage in illegally obtaining consumer records, whether electronically or by other deceptive acts.
* Strong industry-law enforcement cooperation.
* Additional resources for federal, state and local law enforcement to focus on identity thieves.
* Accelerated development and adoption by data aggregators of information security process and methods as well as new technology tools to foil perpetrators and catch offenders.
* A coordinated inter-industry effort to establish a consensus set of best practices, policy standard, solution and education.
For more information on the ITAA’s plan, go to http://www.itaa.org
