Copyright 2000 Journal Sentinel Inc.
Milwaukee
Journal Sentinel
April 25, 2000 Tuesday FINAL EDITION
SECTION: NEWS; Pg. 01A
LENGTH: 994 words
HEADLINE:
Law boosts personal data protection;
License checkoffs bar mass release
BYLINE: RICHARD P. JONES of the Journal Sentinel staff
BODY:
Madison -- Wisconsin residents will be able
to more easily block telemarketers and direct-mail firms from getting access to
personal information under a privacy
protection bill signed into law Monday by Gov. Tommy G. Thompson.
Under
the law, people applying for driver's licenses, hunting and fishing licenses and
occupational licenses will be able to check off a box to keep three state
agencies that issue those licenses from selling their information in bulk form.
The agencies -- the departments of transportation, natural resources,
and regulation and licensing -- can release information, but only in batches of
10 or fewer at a time.
"State residents shouldn't have to worry about
losing a part of their privacy when they do business with the state," Thompson
said at a bill-signing ceremony in Watertown. "We need to do more to make sure
personal information of Wisconsin residents stays private." Assembly Majority
Leader Steve Foti (R-Oconomowoc), author of the bill, said the new law would
help prevent identify theft.
" Over and over, we hear about the stories
of identity theft," Foti said. "By enacting this law, we give people control of
their personal information that is collected by state government."
In
the past, people could ask state agencies to keep their personal information
from telemarketers, but few individuals realized they had the option, according
to one privacy advocate.
Requiring the three agencies to include the
opt-out provision right on permit applications is a major step forward, said
Carole Doeppers, director of the data privacy project for the American Civil
Liberties Union of Wisconsin.
"This is going to make it a lot easier,
because the opt-out provision will be more user-friendly, right on the form,"
Doeppers said. "A lot more people will know about it and take advantage of it."
Doeppers and others said the new law strikes the proper balance between
two competing interests: an individual's privacy vs. the public's right to know.
" Reporters can still do their stories," she said. "Quite honestly,
stalkers can still track license numbers, unfortunately. But the telemarketers
may be limited by asking for entire databases of information."
Sen. Jon
Erpenbach (D-Middleton) said the new law was an attempt to put such information
beyond the reach of telemarketers or other vendors using the data for mass
mailings. He said they can still get the data, but with difficulty.
"They would have to come back to the state over and over and over
again," he said. "The idea behind all of this was to try to find a way where we
could balance Wisconsin's good, progressive open-records law with that of open
season on consumers when they give information over to the state."
The
Department of Transportation already faced restrictions under a 1994 federal law
that prohibits states from releasing an individual's name, address, telephone
and Social Security number without that person's consent. That law was
challenged in the courts, however; it was upheld in January by the U.S. Supreme
Court.
Doeppers said Monday there was talk in Congress of changing the
federal law, known as the Driver's Privacy Protection Act. Even if Congress
does, she said, Wisconsin now has a better state law in place that applies not
only to DOT records, but to data kept by two other agencies.
"The fur is
still flying on DPPA," Doeppers said. "So I think it's still important to have
it in place here in Wisconsin, until the dust finally settles."
Joe
Maassen, a DOT attorney, described Wisconsin's new law as "in some ways
duplicative" of the federal law. He said, however, it would require the agency
to put an opt- out box on applications for a driver's license or motor vehicle
registration forms.
Maassen said the new law would have minimal fiscal
impact on the agency. He estimated the agency provided such information in bulk
to vendors essentially at cost. The agency received $25,000 to
$50,000 a year, he estimated.
"It is not a big
moneymaker," Maassen said. "It is not a big program where if this revenue is no
longer available to the department, it's going to make a difference."
The department can still provide information in bulk on driving records
to insurance companies at $3 per record request, Maassen said.
He said that exchange of data amounts to $9 million a year.
The new state law also does not apply to information the three agencies
may share with other state agencies or provide to law enforcement authorities or
to federal agencies.
The bill as proposed in the Assembly applied only
to DOT records. In the Senate, it was amended to include the other two agencies.
Erpenbach said the new law provides significant additional protections that go
beyond the federal law.
"Imagine all the people who hunt and fish or
snowmobile in this state," Erpenbach said. "I still think the bill goes a long
way to give people a little more control over their information."
The
Wisconsin Newspaper Association initially had problems with the bill, according
to Executive Director Sandra George. But she said the new law simply informs
people of a right they already have to request that their information be
withheld.
"We aren't the ones to tell people they can't tell people what
their lawful rights are," George said. She said newspapers already were having
trouble getting records from the DOT because of the federal law.
The
federal law was prompted in part by the slaying of actress Rebecca Schaeffer in
her California residence. Schaeffer was killed by a stalker who was able to get
her address by hiring a private investigator, who had access to state motor
vehicle department records.
George said the irony of the federal law is
that it would not have prevented Schaeffer's death because private investigators
are among those exempt under the law.
"So it's been pretty much a public
ploy, which makes people think they have more privacy than they do," George
said.
LOAD-DATE: May 16, 2000
