10/31/2007

News / Local 2 Investigates Consumers' Right to Know

Linked from: http://www.click2houston.com/news/14464425/detail.html

HOUSTON -- Note: The following story is a verbatim transcript of an Investigators story that aired on Tuesday, Oct. 30, 2007, on KPRC Local 2 at 10 p.m.

Local 2 investigates your sensitive, personal information being sent out of the country. Last night, our hidden cameras uncovered how Washington Mutual was sending hundreds of thousands of consumer loan files to Mexico -- information like your Social Security number, driver's license and bank account numbers.

Tonight, investigative reporter Robert Arnold explains why lawmakers have tried, but failed to give consumers the right to know when this is happening.


When loads of personal loan information hit the road from Houston to Juarez, Mexico, Local 2 Investigates was on the trail.

We uncovered Washington Mutual emptied it's consumer loan records warehouse in Houston and sent the files to this warehouse in Juarez, a border-town notorious for its crime problems. But as a customer, you likely never know this is happening.

"Most companies do not want to tell the public that they're outsourcing their personal information," said privacy expert Larry Ponemon, Ph.D.

And they don't have to. Nothing in the law requires financial institutions like Washington Mutual to notify customers went it sends personal information out of the country, as long as the work is considered necessary to its business practices.

"If a company, corporation, financial institution decides to move that to another country, the consumer ought to know that," U.S. Rep. Ted Poe said. "They ought to be put on notice immediately."

Some of Poe's colleagues on Capitol Hill share his sentiment. In the past three years, two lawmakers filed bills that would require companies to notify customers if their sensitive data was sent to a foreign country. The bills would even give the customers the right to opt out. Neither bill passed.

"The average consumer does not want to have their information outsourced anywhere," Ponemon said.

Ponemon is a nationally recognized expert in privacy laws and data security.

"There's no benefit, no economic benefit to the consumer," Ponemon said.

Ponemon also says outsourcing to a country like Mexico makes the job even riskier.

"For the most part Mexico has no privacy law or the laws that exist are so loosely defined that it really doesn't protect even the Mexican citizen," Ponemon said.

In fact, when a congressional study graded foreign countries based on privacy laws, Mexico, along with several other countries, got an "F."

"I think it's a big risk to send it to Mexico at this point," said Ponemon.

The government does have some oversight in this area. Banks like Washington Mutual are overseen by the Federal Office of Thrift Supervision. This office has the authority to send examiners to foreign countries to inspect facilities handling personal financial information from the United States. When Local 2 asked if the office has ever inspected any specific facilities in Mexico, officials refused to answer, citing agency policy.

"It bothers me, but it doesn't surprise me that they won't respond to the inquiry and they won't respond, it seems to me, because they haven't done it," said Poe.

That's why Poe says it's time to revive the debate over a consumer's right to know.

"When you start outsourcing jobs, that's one thing," Poe said. "When you start outsourcing personal information to another country that makes it even worse."

Unless the law is changed, then it's up to you to ask if your financial institution is sending your personal information to a foreign country and make a decision from there.

Lawmakers aren't entirely to blame for this situation.

A survey conducted by Larry Ponemon, Ph.D. shows that while a majority of people do not want their personal information sent to a foreign country, 73 percent of those who responded to the same survey also said they were not willing to pay higher prices in order to keep their personal information in the United States.

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