A Public Eye On Public Officials

India's Rule for Dealing With "Stupid Americans"

dbloys@door.net (David W. Bloys) — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 15:59:54 EST

Few Americans have ever heard of the 35=10 rule, but it It could be a lesson in what Indian executives have learned from observing American officials and corporate execs.

Few Americans have ever heard of the 35=10 rule. It isn't taught in our colleges or part of any U.S. business course. The formula isn't based on fact but it is what Indian executives believe they have learned from working with American officials and corporate execs and it is the first thing they want new trainees to know.

I learned about the 35=10 rule from from a report in ITExaminer.com by Subhankar Kundu.

“’35 = 10’, the instructor wrote in a big bold letters on the blackboard”

The 35=10 formula isn't based on fact, or science but is instead based on a popular novel. It could be a lesson in what Indian executives have learned from observing American officials and corporate execs.

“‘Remember’, the instructor said to the class, ‘a thirty-five-year old American’s brain and IQ is the same as a ten-year-old Indian’s brain. This will help you to understand your clients. You need to be as patient as you are when dealing with a child".

As an American, this angered me to the point of frustration but it does explain why BPO workers seem so condescending and arrogant on the phone. It doesn't explain how Indian companies came to have such a low opinion of their customers.

It seems Indian company executives may have formed this opinion while dealing with their U.S. counterparts. After all, how gullible must an American exec be to think that staffing his company's consumer service center with people who cannot properly speak english would improve costumer relations in an English speaking country?

Indian belief in the stupidity of Americans is reinforced when they see U.S. officials, plagued with identity theft by foreign criminals warn Americans to guard our private information on the Internet, while other officials recklessly post the same data on government websites and call it a public service.

Comparing a 35-year-old American to a ten-your-old Indian child also seems even more accurate when observing state and county officials in the U.S. carelessly playing with their new internet toys (and the lives of citizens) by recklessly dumping constituent data all over the internet.

American officials should know better. Indian officials certainly do. Officials in India do not post their constituents private information online. But they have no problem with encouraging their citizens exploit the childish behavior of some U.S. state and county officials.

A BPOIndia.org post tells how "Identity theft and Phishing are being promoted within BPO employees."

The short BPOIndia report says"...[Identity Theft} has become more prevalent as easily accessible information about people has become more prevalent".

It seems apparent that India's low opinion of American intellect is derived from what outsourcing companies have learned from naive US public officials and greedy corporate decision makers eager to find cheaper ways to exploit public records comiled at taxpayer expense.

The 35-10 formula taught by Indian trainers was first seen in a best selling Indian novel by Chetan Bhagat where the lead character recalls his training days as a BPO employee.

While outsourcing companies may deny this arrogant and racial attitude was learned from U.S. officials and corporate execs it continues to be taught in BPO training.

The instructor concluded his first lesson to Indian trainees with, "Americans are dumb, just accept it".

Are Americans really that dumb? No, but judging by the sloppy decisions of some U.S. politicians and corporate executives in dealing with Indian outsourcers it isn't hard to understand why Indians might come to this conclusion.

Government's Link to Cyberstalking and Murder

dbloys@door.net (David W. Bloys) — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 23:31:03 EST

Many people think the most dangerous thing about public record Web sites is the risk of identity theft. The fact is, government Web sites can cost you much more than your identity. They can cost you your life or the life of someone you love.

For decades, criminal stalkers have used remote access to public records to facilitate crimes that lead to the violent death of their victims. Remote electronic access to the California Department of Motor vehicle database facilitated the murder of actress Rebecca Schaeffer 1987. Federal legislators recognized the link and passed the Driver Protection Act to prevent such a tragedy from ever happening again.

Ten years later, Liam Youens used public records available from a "public records" website to stalk and kill twenty-year-old college student Amy Boyer.

At 4:30 p.m. Oct. 15, 1999, Amy left her job at a dental office. As she was getting into her car, Youens pulled up, jumped from his vehicle and fired 15 shots into her. Her injuries included a fatal head wound. Youens used the 16th bullet to shoot himself in the head.

The reason we know so much about Youens is that he documented his plans to murder Amy on a web site he created to publish his sick desires.

Youens wrote on his site, “I found an internet site to do that, and to my surprize everything else under the Sun. Most importantly: her current employment. It's accually(sp) obsene (sp)what you can find out about a person on the internet.

A few days later, Youens carried out his plans to murder the young woman, but criminal abuse of Amy's privacy didn't end with her death.

Two days after the Boyer murder made the news, identity thieves again used the records to assume the dead girl's identity and write $5,000 in checks in her name.

Although it is difficult to track, a report from the US Attorney General's Office noted that "there may be potentially tens or even hundreds of thousands of victims of recent cyberstalking incidents in the United States."

You - or someone you love could be the next victim of cyber stalkers and the Web sites that help them.

Lawsuit Debates Who Will Display Public/Private Data Online

dbloys@door.net (David W. Bloys) — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 11:34:36 EST

Maybe you’ve never heard of B.J. Ostergren, but she knows a lot about you. She has your driver’s license number, your signature, credit card and bank numbers and she has your Social Security number. Likely as not, she has the goods on your elected officials as well. She gathered it all from government websites...

Maybe you’ve never heard of B.J. Ostergren, but she knows a lot about you. She knows where you live and how much you pay to live there. She has your driver’s license number, your signature, credit card and bank numbers and she has your Social Security number. Likely as not, she has the goods on your parents and children as well. She gathered it all from government websites.

The Virginia Watchdog wants the state to stop displaying your private data online but a new law in Virginia says government agencies have an exclusive right to display private data contained in public records online. Now Ostergren is taking her battle to federal court.

Ostergren has gleaned from online government records the Social Security numbers of many prominent people — Jeb Bush, Colin Powell, Porter Goss and Tom DeLay among them — and posted the documents on her own Web site to demonstrate government’s failure to protect individuals’ privacy.

"I'm not going after the little guy, I'm going after people of prominence that could have some power to do something about this," Ostergren said.

Ostergren’s website, TheVirginiaWatchdog.com advocates against making personal information available on the Internet. The website includes public records obtained by Ostergren from government websites that include the Social Security Numbers of public officials. By posting these documents, Ostergren hopes to illustrate the type of information available on government websites, and to prod officials to take action.

Perhaps most offensive to Virginia officials are the links Ostergren posts on her site that document just how easy it is to find documents containing Social Security numbers and other private data belonging to Virginia's own legislators, judges and county officials.

In March, Virginia legislators reacted to Ostergren’s website by amending a state law prohibiting anyone except government agencies from posting private data online. Under the previous law, individuals were prohibited from disclosing Social Security numbers obtained from private sources, but millions of public records containing Social Security numbers and other private information are available in Virginia on the state’s own websites.

Government websites have become a rich source of data needed by terrorists, identity thieves and stalkers.

Experts say terrorism and identity theft go hand in hand. The al-Qaida training manual US troops found on a laptop computer in Afghanistan includes provisions for trainees to leave camp with five fake personas, says Judith Collins, an identity theft expert, who uses a copy of the manual to train law enforcement officials. Terrorists are regularly schooled in the art of subsisting off credit card fraud while living in the United States, Collins says. The manual also instructs would-be terrorists on the easiest way to find the information they need.

According to former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, speaking on January 15, 2003, the al Qaeda training manual tells its readers, "Using public sources openly and without resorting to illegal means, it is possible to gather at least 80 percent of all information required about the enemy."

The concept of document security by paid or free subscription to government websites has also proven deadly for at least two young women. Amy Boyer and Rebecca Schaeffer both lost their lives as a result of stalkers accessing their information through government websites. The 1989 murder of TV actress Rebecca Schaeffer resulted in the often-ignored National Driver Protection Act which makes it illegal for companies to buy driver records from state governments. Cases abound of government websites failing to protect constituents when publishing private data contained in public records online.

In an advisory dated August 8th, 2006, Ken Schrad, Director of Virginia's Division of Information Resources announced that the State's Bureau of Insurance Website published the Social Security numbers of every insurance agent licensed in the state. He advised the state's 202,000 agents, many of whom sell identity theft insurance, to watch for any unusual activity on their bank or other financial accounts that might result from the massive breach.

Under the new law, Virginia citizens are prohibited from repeating the state’s mistakes by publishing copies of public documents containing Social Security numbers on private websites or Blogs. But the law allows Virginia’s “official” websites to continue trafficking in identities with almost complete abandon. Virtually anyone-- anywhere in the world with an internet connection and twenty five dollars for a subscription to the county website may be granted remote online access to your Social Security number and other private data.

Earlier this month, the American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia filed a lawsuit on Ostergren’s behalf in federal court in Richmond. Ostergren is challenging the law that targets her website on grounds it violates the First Amendment’s protection of freedom of speech.. She has launched a federal lawsuit that questions who if anyone, has the right to distribute your private/public papers online for the entire world to see. At issue is who has the right to traffic in your identity.

When Virginia Governor Timothy M. Kaine signed the bill on March 11, he and others touted the bill as an effort to curb identity theft, suffered by an estimated 9 million Americans each year. But even the lawmaker behind the bill (Sen. R. Edward Houck) acknowledged that stopping people like Ostergren from publishing the Social Security numbers — not protecting Virginians from identity theft — was the true goal of the legislation.

Ostergren says her tactic of bringing bold and personal awareness to elected officials has worked in other states, such as Vermont, New York, New Mexico, California, Ohio and Florida, where she has fought to get personal information removed from online records. Only in her home state have lawmakers responded by unanimously passing legislation making Ostergren’s tactics illegal and punishable by a $2,500 civil penalty.

Ironically, the questioned statute takes effect on July 1, the same date by which circuit court clerks across the state are required to make all land records available on the Internet. Land records consist of deeds and mortgage documents, but may also include legal judgments, such as divorce decrees and probate, that often contain Social Security Numbers and other personal information. The ACLU is seeking an injunction prohibiting the state from enforcing the law against Ostergren.

“The ACLU is an advocate for laws that prevent the government from allowing Social Security Numbers to appear on publicly accessible websites,” said ACLU of Virginia Executive Director Kent Willis, “but when the government puts records online that do contain the numbers, it can’t then turn around and prevent the public from disseminating them.”

“Instead of the Virginia General Assembly dealing with the real problem of Social Security numbers being put on Web sites by circuit court clerks, they decided to target me because I posted theirs,” Ostergren told the Washington Examiner.

“This is a wrong-end-up law that attempts to conceal the fact that Virginia’s lawmakers have failed to prevent Social Security Numbers from being placed online in the first place,” added Willis. “If Social Security Numbers were removed from public records when they are placed online, there would be no need for this law.”

While Virginia already has a law requiring Social Security numbers to be redacted from documents posted on the Internet, the legislature failed to fund the privacy statute. Redaction efforts in other states have proven to be largely ineffective and extremely expensive.

The ACLU lobbied against the passage of Virginia’s new law prohibiting anyone except the government from posting Social Security numbers online and asked the Governor to veto it.

When she found out in 2002 that every locality in Virginia would begin posting personal information online, she started The Virginia Watchdog from her Hanover County home.

The lawsuit, which alleges that the law violates Ostergren's First Amendment rights, points out that shutting down Ostergren’s website will do nothing to protect Social Security Numbers, since all of the documents on the site are also available on government websites. In the 1989 case The Florida Star v. B.J.F., the Supreme Court observed that “where the government has made certain information publicly available, it is highly anomalous to sanction persons other than the source [government websites] of its release.”

Today millions of people from all over the world routinely search and seize our most sensitive documents from government websites. The records can then be used by international criminals to take your property, homes - even your life. Surely this wasn't what the framers of the constitution had in mind when they promised in the Fourth Amendment, "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated..."

ACLU of Virginia Legal Director Rebecca K. Glenberg is providing legal representation to Ostergren. A copy of the ACLU’s complaint can be found online at http://www.acluva.org/docket/pleadings/ostergren_complaint.pdf.

Interested parties can Contact Kent Willis or Rebecca Glenberg at 804/644-8022

Problems With Websites, Women, and Workers Sparks Investigation

dbloys@door.net (David W. Bloys) — Tue, 20 May 2008 15:27:27 EST

The following is an abridged version of an article currently running in the Allegations of Official Misconduct section of News For Public Officials.

Cuyahoga County Recorder Patrick O'Malley has a problem with women. He says they ruined his life and destroyed his career. O'Malley's guilty plea last Thursday may end the arrogant Democrat official’s 20-year political career. But it won’t end public concern about the people we elect to protect our most sensitive information using the Internet to exploit us.

Patrick O'Malley

The investigation that led to O'Malleys plea to of importing and transporting obscene materials been ongoing since FBI agents seized personal computers from O’Malley’s home in 2004 after his ex-wife tipped federal authorities to possible crimes.

O'Malley's lawyer, Ian Friedman, said the images did not include child pornography but said O'Malley's computer contained images that jurors may have considered legally obscene.

"There is certain material that crosses the line," Friedman said."

Problems with women

In July 2004 O'Malley was arrested on a misdemeanor charge of domestic violence against Vicki, his second wife.

In November, FBI agents raided O'Malley's Chagrin Falls home looking for evidence of a business deal that O'Malley helped broker and images of child pornography. Two personal computers belonging to O’Malley were confiscated. The incident might have gone unnoticed until Vicki made the warrant public by placing information about the search in her Ohio Lottery personnel file and tipping the media.

O’Malley’s problems with women continued the following year when ex-girlfriend Marion Rivera called police in two suburbs, over a few days, complaining that O'Malley was verbally abusive to her.

O'Malley said he caught Rivera cheating and threw her out. He vowed to quit dating for a while. "Women have ruined my life and career," he said.

O'Malley's vow didn’t stop him from asking Cathy Luks to lunch at a popular political hangout in January 2008 shortly after she filed to run against him for Cuyahoga County recorder. Midway through their 75-minute meeting O’Malley offered Luks a $50,000-a-year job in his office if she dropped out of the race. Luks refused his offer but documented the conversation with a recorder hidden in her pocket and later provided the tape to local media.

"It doesn't matter who the Democratic machine comes up with [to replace O'Malley]. There can no longer be one-party rule if there is to be accountability," Ms. Luks said, in an interview with the Plain Dealer.

Problems with Workers

Last month The Plain Dealer exposed widespread problems with worker patronage in O'Malley's office. A review of his 2007 payroll showed he gave out nearly three dozen jobs, with a combined payroll of $1.4 million, to politically connected people and their family.

Last month, The Plain Dealer reported at least a third of the employees on O'Malley's 2007 recorder payroll landed their jobs through political connections, including ward leaders and precinct committee members who helped him gain the recorder's job in 1997. The story also said, O'Malley employs nearly twice as many people as the Franklin County recorder.

Within hours of O'Malley's resignation, County Auditor Frank Russo ordered an immediate inventory of computer equipment in O'Malley's former office. The reason: For at least four years O'Malley had barred county workers from conducting an annual state-mandated review of the equipment.

Potential Flight Risk?

Court records and sources close to the story hint that O'Malley was making plans to leave the country.

If O’Malley leaves the country to avoid sentencing, he won't be the first county official to run from justice when faced with time in a federal prison.

Last February former Texas Hidalgo County District Clerk Omar Guerrero was captured by Mexican State Police in Reynosa, Mexico where he had been hiding for two and a half months after a warrant was issued charging the Republican clerk with sexual crimes. Guerrero allegedly had sex with a 15-Year-Old girl numerous times and the victim claims he threatened to use his political position to harm her and her family if she reported the assaults.

Five months after Guerrero's capture, Missouri State Police launched a statewide manhunt for former Butler County Clerk John Dunivan, 60, who disappeared after being accused of sexually abusing two children under 12 years of age. When the state police manhunt failed to produce Dunavan, A U.S. magistrate in St. Louis issued a warrant for "unlawful flight to avoid prosecution.”

Dunivan is still on the run and was featured last month on Fox TV’s popular series America’s Most Wanted.

The public doesn't have a problem with women, web sites or county workers. Our problem is with elected officials who use their elected position and the Internet to exploit all of us.