Documents containing four people’s Social Security and bank account numbers were found, unshredded, in a trash bin outside of Ventura County Superior Court last month — a prime opportunity for identity thieves, though there’s no evidence of theft.
“That’s all you need, for sure,” to steal someone’s identity, said Larry Troxel, a private investigator in Camarillo, after he was shown the documents.
The documents, all of them records from the court’s traffic division, were discovered and mailed to The Star by a courthouse employee who asked to remain anonymous. Two subsequent trips to the Ventura courthouse, including one accompanied by a court administrator, did not turn up any other sensitive documents.
Robert Sherman, the court’s deputy executive officer, said he thinks leaving the documents intact and in an open bin was a one-time mistake.
“All of this should have been shredded,” he said.
One man whose bank account number was on the discarded documents said the security breach doesn’t bother him.
“I’m glad they don’t make a habit out of it, but I’m not that concerned,” said Colin Brown, 29, a Camarillo resident who paid a traffic fine at the courthouse in July. “There’s so much personal garbage with your information that you yourself throw out every day. If someone really wants it, they can get it.”
Sherman said every court department has shredders, and employees are trained to shred anything with sensitive information, such as a Social Security, bank account or driver’s license number. Anything that’s not shredded is placed in a locked recycling bin that’s picked up twice a week by E.J. Harrison & Sons.
Instead, the ones sent to The Star were thrown away in an open bin next to the locked one.
Sherman said he will issue “a little reminder” to court employees on the proper procedures for document destruction.
“We can’t have this kind of thing,” he said. “In this day and age, it’s all too simple for crooks to look for that type of information and steal your identity.”
Howard Wise, a senior deputy district attorney who prosecutes identity theft cases, said thieves often go “Dumpster diving” outside of businesses for customer records, though no one’s ever been caught trying it at the courthouse.
If the court were a private business, its actions would have violated state law. California’s civil code requires businesses to take “all reasonable steps” to destroy both paper and electronic records with personal information.
However, “the government always excludes itself from these rules,” said Paul Stephens, the director of policy and advocacy for the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, a San Diego nonprofit consumer organization that advocates for consumer privacy and monitors business and government for data security breaches.
Stephens said the Ventura County Superior Court’s carelessness is “absolutely outrageous.”
“Those people are being set up for identity theft,” he said. Thieves could use the information to open bank accounts, obtain credit cards and buy cars in their victims’ names, he said.
