Public-data site under fire for planned sale
BY THE ASSOCIATED PRESSDES MOINES - A public-records web site operated by a group of county officials has confirmed it was trying to sell information that includes Social Security numbers to a real estate database company.
The site, IowaLandRecords.org, said Wednesday it negotiated selling its database and ongoing updates for about $11,750 a month to Data Tree, a company that manages more than 4 billion records nationwide.
The site includes home mortgage records and other documents from each of the state's 99 counties. It is run by the Iowa County Recorders Association, a group of county officials who electronically post hundreds of thousands of public documents.
Privacy experts say the personal data on the site could lead to identity theft. Portions of the site containing personal data were temporarily shut down on Wednesday.
Recorders association officials agreed to temporarily hold off on the sale earlier this year after lawmakers expressed concern.
''Selling these, I personally believe, is not ethical,'' said Steffen Schmidt, an Iowa State University political science professor and co-author of ''The Silent Crime,'' a new book about identity theft. ''The responsibility of public agencies is to serve the public and it's not usually to turn their assets into commodities.''
The recorders association's Web site costs roughly $700,000 a year to run. It's paid largely by a $1 fee for documents that are recorded.
In addition, most counties allocate $2,000 a year from their local budgets to support the project.
An unsigned agreement obtained by The Des Moines Register on Wednesday would prohibit Data Tree from disclosing confidential information to any third party.
Some said restricting the information on the site makes it less useful.
''Iowa Land Records is a valuable and important resource to the real estate industry and to the citizens of Iowa,'' said Joyce Jensen, chairwoman of the Iowa Land Records governing board and Cass County recorder. ''That value diminishes when information is restricted.''
Lawmakers have set up an interim committee that will meet in November, partly to review the possible sale.
