Privacy Is Easy To Breach? Not When It’s Public Record

Originally penned Friday, July 15, 2005

San Francisco columnist David Lazarus wrote an article today (Friday, July 15, 2005) that made me really think about the motives behind media reporters today.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2005/07/15/BUG0UDO7R31.DTL&type=business

In this article, he claims that through the internet (why do people capitalize the “Internet” when it is just a noun and not a proper name?) people can easily do what they could not otherwise do: breach your privacy. He then illustrated his point by using several website search engines (Google, ZabaSearch, and fee-based LexisNexis) to find information about Valerie Wilson, nee Plame. By using common sleuthing skills, he found the correct Joesph C. Wilson and his address, then found the link to his wife, Valerie E Wilson. He then searched some more to find out Valerie’s former name, Plame. He claims that the internet lead him to the identity of a CIA cover agent.

Unless this reporter left out some very significant steps, this internet searching did not lead him to the identity of a CIA cover agent. All he got was public information about two people who live in the United States. Even without the internet, this type of investigation could render the same results by going to the courthouses where birth and marriage certificates were filed. Private investigators and reporters used to do this sort of thing all the time. Had Mr. Lazarus found that LexisNexis gave information about Ms. Plame’s status as a CIA operative before the leak, then he would have a news story.

Even undercover agents need some sort of public information about them. This public information lends credibility to their assumed identity to those they come in contact with every day. This is logical to find public information about Ms. Valerie Plame, or anyone else. If a foreign person had questions about Ms. Plame and her employer, they also can easily go to the internet and find out that indeed where she lived and who “employed” her. And before the whole leak happened, they should not have also found anywhere on the web linking Ms. Plame to the CIA. And that is the way it should be.

So, to make this “Privacy is easy to breach” story something to really be worth of print, instead of finding public information of record, that this reporter should have dug in and tried to find the private medical records of Ms. Valerie Plame easily on the internet. Those files ought to be private and confidential, and if easily found, would warrant such a headline.

Otherwise, Mr. Lazarus is using public information to scare us into thinking that our privacy is being invaded, when in actuality, it isn’t.