Transparency News 7/31/19

Wednesday
July 31, 2019

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state & local news stories

“Legislatures now serve as the place where ordinary hard-working Americans become extraordinary ambassadors of their neighborhoods, towns and cities and strive together to secure the blessings of liberty.”

Senator Toi Hutchinson (D-Ill.), president of NCSL, spoke Tuesday in Jamestown, Va., at an event to commemorate the 400th anniversary of representative democracy in the United States. Her remarks from the event follow. “When the group of 20 Burgesses convened here in Jamestown on this day in 1619, little did they know that they were establishing a template for self-governance that would endure for 400 years. . . That evolution is breathtaking—from that rudimentary gathering of a handful of land-owning, white men to professional legislative bodies filled with the best and brightest of every race, every creed and every gender. Legislatures now serve as the place where ordinary hard-working Americans become extraordinary ambassadors of their neighborhoods, towns and cities and strive together to secure the blessings of liberty.”
National Conference of State Legislatures

A former Prince William County police lieutenant has been charged with computer invasion of privacy after an audit revealed unauthorized use of a law-enforcement database to access citizens’ personal information. “The accused is alleged to have accessed personal, identifiable information of citizens using a law enforcement database, LInX-Law Enforcement Information Exchange, for unauthorized purposes,” Prince William police Sgt. Jonathan Perok said in the release. An investigation began in February following the discovery of inappropriate use of the database during a routine annual internal audit.
Inside NoVa

Shenandoah County Public School administrators recently announced a vendor they once used had a data breach that compromised some student and administrator data. The school division used software called AIMSweb 1.0, a product of Pearson Assessments, in its elementary and middle schools for about five years until the 2016-2017 school year, said Dave Hinegardner, director of administrative services and strategic planning. He stressed the data compromised did not contain any grades, Social Security information or credit card information as AIMSweb does not contain this information.
The Northern Virginia Daily

stories of national interest

Discomfort over the collection and sale of personal data led to a flurry of consumer data privacy bills in 2019, as state legislatures vied to follow California’s lead in giving users more control of personal information. But the legislative year ended with more of a whimper than a bang as well-funded tech giants and other business concerns rushed to oppose the bills, and even California is scrambling to fix details of its data privacy law before it takes effect in January. Of the 24 states that considered data privacy legislation this year, only Illinois, Maine and Nevada enacted new laws.
Governing

When a Kansas agency used a jobs fund to give a rural school district $90,000 to start a Future Farmers of America chapter and agricultural education program, officials called it a “unique economic development” opportunity. State employees objected to the award, but were overruled. Auditors now are questioning that award and others from the Kansas Job Creation Program Fund. They found the state Department of Commerce, which controls the fund, sometimes provided money without requiring an application and had no written policies guiding who should get funding and how much. The agency required some companies to produce jobs and other measurable activity to receive an award but not others, an audit report released Monday shows.
Governing

Los Angeles city computers were breached last week in a data theft potentially involving the personal information of about 20,000 applicants to the police department, including hundreds who are now sworn officers. The cyberattack highlights the vulnerability of government computer systems, with the city of Los Angeles subjected to billions of hacking attempts in the last five years, according to Ted Ross, general manager of the city’s Information Technology Agency. A person who identified himself or herself as a hacker contacted the city last Thursday, revealing inside knowledge of a database of people who applied to the LAPD between 2010 and 2018 or early 2019, Ross said. City officials were concerned that the entire database was compromised and quickly began notifying the job applicants, who had logged on to a website for updates during the lengthy process of becoming a police officer.
Los Angeles Times

“The cyberattack highlights the vulnerability of government computer systems, with the city of Los Angeles subjected to billions of hacking attempts in the last five years.”

editorials & columns

“Public employees need to be better trained to do business in this digital world.”

The Virginia Freedom of Information Act Advisory Council is now studying the effects of phishing on citizens and public employees, and a subcommittee is expected to make recommendations on ways to address these issues. During its July 17 meeting, the council heard about an instance in Portsmouth where someone pretending to be the fire chief — using a similar email address — sent an email with nefarious links to other city employees, some of whom clicked the links. It takes more than an email address or phone number to steal someone’s identity. Even a well-disguised ruse requires bank account information, social security numbers and other personal information that cannot be obtained through FOIA. Public employees need to be better trained to do business in this digital world. That could include seminars on cybersecurity, phishing and the FOIA process. They also need to have a better understanding of this 21st-century economy, where email addresses and cell phone numbers are sold in bulk as a part of the commercial domain. That’s why data breaches at major retailers are so alarming. But none of those things have to do with the public’s right to obtain information about who is working for their locality and the best methods to contact them.
Daily Press

State law also says governments can charge copying costs for conveying the information to the requester. Requesters of information often are blindsided by counter-requests for payment. In fairness, the question of payment for public access isn’t easy to resolve. From a philosophical standpoint, there is this argument: Since the information already belongs to the public — governments exist to serve us, the people; and public servants are employed by us — then handing public information back to the public should be simple, routine and without cost. It should be a normal cost of doing business, not an “extra” duty with an added charge. The practical side of the issue is more complicated. That’s because information is more complicated — and more copious. Governments, however, must strive to hit a fair balance between the practical and the ideal.
The Daily Progress