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Web Background Checks - More Databases, More Errors
A report in the October 22nd issue of The New York Times explores the increase in pre-employment background checks of American workers, including those applying for work in low-paid positions like retail sales. Only a few years ago, employers had to hire a private detective to investigate a person's background. Today it's possible to obtain hundreds of records about a person's background for a hundred dollars or less using one's personal computer.
Many public records have been placed on the Internet in recent years as information brokers have linked with public agencies, governments and businesses for computer access that enables them to compile virtual dossiers on anyone, including data like Social Security numbers, property ownership, driving records, and nearest relatives.
Unfortunately, available on-line investigative services range from those offered by blue chip investigative corporations to those available from startup Web sites. Therefore, it is hard for anyone who is the subject of a background check to know what has been searched and the data quality of the search results. According to the Times, background checks are more critical than ever because of increased employer liability for criminal acts committed by employees with previous criminal records. About 70% of employers now conduct some form of pre-employment background check.
Groups concerned with privacy rights say that mistakes in reporting personal data happen routinely. One big problem is "identity theft." One person steals another's purse or wallet and the victim subsequently suffers the effects of "bad" information - sometimes for a decade or more. Under recent amendment to the Fair Credit Reporting Act, job applicants have the right to see and correct credit reports. And an applicant must sign a document giving an employer permission to conduct a background check. The concern over poor data quality in employment records has spawned a number of do-your-own search services that, for a fee, will scout out the available data about applicants.
According to the Times, when a person finds inaccurate personal information about him or her, the only recourse is to go back to the original source of the information. At times, that can be a lengthy process. The report was written by Susan Wells and appears on page E1.
Look-Alike Names Lead to Drug Mix-Ups
According to an article in the October 21st issue of The Wall Street Journal, similar trademarked names for different prescription drugs are causing confusion among health care providers that can lead to serious (or fatal) consequences for patients. Names like "Nicoderm" (a nicotine anti-smoking patch) and "Nitroderm" (a nitroglycerin patch for angina) have caused concern among pharmacists, hospital administrators, and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
The problem is compounded by poor physicians' handwriting and pharmacists who don't take the time to explain the effects and side-effects of prescription drugs. There about 100,000 different drug names being used worldwide. According to the Journal, name confusion causes about one-fourth of all medication errors. Both the FDA and informal networks of non-profit groups and pharmicists are doing what they can to prevent problems when new drugs are named. But once drugs are entrenched in the market, companies rarely agree to change them, and the FDA can't force a change. The report was written by Journal staff reporter Rochelle Sharpe and appears on page B1.
EU Aims to Protect Privacy of Data
A front page article in The New York Times on October 26th examines the implications of the European Union's recent law prohibiting American-style buying and selling of personal data, a move that could interrupt electronic commerce with the United States if the two sides can't resolve deep philosophical and legal differences over protecting privacy.
According to the Times, the new law affects an enormous range of information that corporations collect in the course of daily business, ranging from credit card transactions to magazine subscriptions. The law was adopted three years ago by the European Union. The law has the potential to disrupt electronic commerce between Europe and the United States. A key provision of the new measure would prohibit any company doing business in the EU from transmitting personal data to any country that doesn't guarantee comparable privacy protection.
Current American privacy laws are far more lax than European laws, and consist of a hodge-podge of statutes and regulations enforced by various state and Federal agencies charged with oversight of other industries, like bank regulation. Unlike Europe, an entire industry has been formed in the United States that specializes in controlling public and private sources for vast quantities of personal information.
The new European directive embraces several basic principles that European governments must now translate into their own laws. It requires that companies tell people when they collect information about them and how it will be used. Moreover, European statutes require that corporations disclose when information is collected about subjects, how the information will be used, and how corporations can provide informed consent to customers and customer access to information about themselves. The article was written by Edmund Andrews.
Nerve Gas Factory 'Evidence' Depends on Beholder
A front-page report in the October 28th issue of The Wall Street Journal examines "evidence" that caused U.S. military forces to destroy the El Shifa pharmaceutical plant in Khartoum, Sudan, with cruise missiles on August 20th. According to the Journal's sources - including U.S. intelligence agencies, - the hardest evidence that the plant was involved in nerve gas production is a soil sample taken "a stone's throw" from the El Shifa plant by a CIA-trained agent as another agent looked on. The soil sample indicated the presence of EMPTA, a chemical that can easily be turned into nerve gas
Other links in the "chain of evidence" outlined by U.S. officials are weaker than past reports have suggested, according to the Journal. The evidence of the pharmaceutical plant's ownership and operation was based on U.S. intelligence agencies' assumptions and media reports. Apparently, U.S. "intelligence" agencies assumed that intercepted conversations between the pharmaceutical plant's personnel and Iraq were about chemical weapons, not about the sale of pharmaceuticals to Iraq. Another data quality complication involves information obtained from parties who hold political grudges against the owners of the pharmaceutical plant.
Lawyers for the pharmaceutical plant's owners are trying to disavow the plant owner's ties to alleged terrorists. The owner's lawyers are also quizzing former El Shifa workers and trying to line up independent laboratories to test the soil near the plant site. Meanwhile, U.S. intelligence officials claim that the U.S. missile attacks may have destroyed any remaining EMPTA in the soil around the plant. The report was written by Journal staff reporter Daniel Pearl.
Planes' Tail Numbers - Exec Jet Tracking Tool
A front page report in the October 29th issue of The Wall Street Journal explores the tracking of the comings and goings of corporate executives by tracking the flight plans of corporate jets. For a fee, the FAA will provide the flight plans (which are filed by computer) to individuals, corporations, and on-line vendors of information.
The flight plans can be a gold mine of information to various groups. Stock market analysts would like to know whose corporate jets are visiting (say) Seattle - the home of Boeing and nearby Microsoft. Shareholders' groups would like to know if corporate executives are junketing to expensive resorts and to major sporting events. (Formerly, shareholders groups jotted down the planes' registration numbers or "tail numbers" at airports.) Operators of aviation-service corporations monitor landings at competing airports, then call corporate pilots to pitch refueling and other services.
Disclosing flight plan data does not make corporations happy. About 125 corporations have persuaded the FAA to withhold flight data for their aircraft. After all, one of the primary reasons corporations purchase private aircraft is for privacy. The article was written by Journal, staff reporter Thomas Goetz.
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