They didn't publish his SSN; they redacted both the SSN and date of birth. They showed far more restraint and responsibility in their response than did the publisher.Venus Pax wrote:Mithras,
I don't think that publishing his social security number was appropriate,
From the Buckeye article:
Speaking of privacy... I hope everyone knows that if you own real property in Texas, anyone --anyone-- can walk into your county courthouse and get your name, address, and SSN right off the tax records.The real goldmine for the person who intends to cause harm to Mr. Westerhold is his Dissolution. With little effort we find his date of birth is 11/**/1958 and his Social Security number is 2**-56-6***. We also see his prior employment history and yearly salary. Having his full name, date of birth, social security number, prior employer, prior salary and current employer and a guess at his salary, combined with knowing from the Dissolution that he has/had an Auto Loan with XYZ bank and knowing his current mortgage amount and details, it would be child’s play for a bad guy to open up credit accounts and commit various other acts of identity theft against him.
There was an attempt this year to require the SSN to be redacted before records were made accessible to the public, but it would have shut down the landman business (among others), because counties don't have the time, staff, or money to do that.
It is a huge gaping flaw in the system in Texas and most other states.