I continue to research how the federal government impinges upon our privacy and restricts our freedom of movement. The latest line of inquiry concerns the privatization of governmental record keeping. I have come upon the NIC, based in Olathe, Kansas. NIC stands for National Information Consortium and they bill themselves as the “people behind eGovernment.” They are a thriving company that went public on the NASDAC in 1999 and have revenues that have risen from $16.1 million in 1999 to $85.8 million in 2007. What do these folks do? They are the leading provider of outsourced eGovernment portals. They “build and manage official government Web sites and eGovernment services for 21 states and hundreds of local governments in the United States.” It all sounds pretty innocuous doesn’t it? So what sort of things do they do? Here is a list of their business services:
CITIZEN SERVICES
• Income & Property Tax Filings
• Courts
BUSINESS SERVICES
• Driver's License and Vehicle Registration Systems
• Ethics and Elections Reporting
• Secretary of State Business Filing Systems
• Corporate Record and Business Name Searches
• Professional License Renewals
• Transportation Compliance Systems
Health License and Case Decision Notifications
Wait a minute! What is Homeland Security doing on that list? And what is “Elections” doing on that list? I hope I’m just being paranoid about this, but here is what worries me the most—as a private company NIC is not subject to the open records laws that apply to governmental entities. They don’t have to tell citizens anything about what they are doing. True, the governmental agencies they serve have to disclose information to us, but my recent skirmish with the drivers license folks here in New Mexico doesn’t give me much confidence.
The man Elyn talked to in the Compliance division of the Motor Vehicle Division assured her that the private company they deal with to produce the new high tech drivers licenses doesn’t collect all our information. He seemed sure of that. Well the NIC site lists among their services a system where “authorized users can search driving records as well as titles, liens, and registrations online for specific business purposes.” How can they do that if the NIC isn’t collecting the information from all the state agencies? How I read this is that NIC is selling our private information to businesses and governmental agencies and making a nice profit. What businesses buy their information? Maybe Homeland Security? I will continue to look into this matter.
You're just paranoid man. Try smoking a little less weed and see if that helps. I had to cut back once too...thought for sure the neighborhood cat was stealin' shit out of my car when I wasn't lookin'
ReplyDelete