news-record.com

GREENSBORO — Issues between online safety and public information collided recently before the Guilford County Board of Commissioners when a woman recommended that the register of deeds shut down its online records.

“The issue is one about Internet safety, and I am an Internet safety expert,” said Linda Criddle of Washington state, president of Look Both Ways online safety consulting.

She didn’t approve of having register of deeds public records online that include details such as Social Security numbers, next of kin and other information.

“My recommendations are to immediately shut down the county access to public records,” she said.

Files such as land records and death certificates are the paperwork that weaves through the lives of Guilford County residents. And Social Security numbers are printed on some of those documents. But the real problem lies between Criddle’s complaint and the responsibility of the register of deeds to provide access to information.

“The (public records) laws of North Carolina govern my office in a big way,” said Jeff Thigpen, Guilford County’s register of deeds. Each month, about 9,000 people search the online files available through his office.

The basic duty of a register of deeds is to record information. Births, deaths and a host of other transactions are recorded in that office. If a land record has a Social Security number on the file, that’s recorded. When death certificates appear with personal information, the register of deeds records them, as is.

Although Criddle has recently brought the issue before the Board of Commissioners, the issue of Internet safety has been ongoing for Thigpen in the past year.

In November 2007, he began looking for a way to scrub those Social Security numbers from 8 million online records.

His office ended up with 20,000 documents that included the numbers. As of this week, about a third of those have been taken from the online documents.

“When we do that, as soon as it’s done, it becomes part of the online record,” he said. But the original document, by law, must remain unchanged, he said.

To do much more would require legislation by the General Assembly, he and others said.

“The law has to meet up with technology,” said Rebecca Cipriani, president of the N.C. Association of the Registers of Deeds, “and we’re trying to balance it. We’re just recorders, and we’re trying to manage these records.”

She said Thigpen’s is the only office that she knows of in the state that’s redacting information from its online documents.

The news that private information is online provoked the Board of Commissioners to request action, although there’s little they can do.

Commissioners don’t hold much power over Thigpen, who is elected to his office by county residents and answers to state rules.

“It’s not just the register of deeds. It’s not just the schools,” said Commissioner Billy Yow. “And I’m a nutso advocate of technology. I think we need more. When it starts to get personal, then I think it becomes a problem.”

The online records were posted as a convenience, say Thigpen, Cipriani and others. But as is the case with online material — including banking accounts, e-mails and Facebook pages — once much of it is out there, it’s out there for good.

“I am concerned, not just for me but for lots of people out there,” said Commissioner Kay Cashion, “and there are too many opportunities out there for identity theft.”

Thigpen said that the online scrubbing of Social Security numbers from records should end in a couple months.

Taking online files down because of a perceived threat isn’t an option, he says. Lawyers, real estate agents and regular people access that information daily for many legitimate reasons.

“That must be available to be used,” he said. “I’m available to work with anybody anywhere.”

Contact Gerald Witt at 373-7008 or gerald.witt@news-record.com