So, how would you explain that the first county in the country to post its real estate records online is the county with the highest incidents of ID theft?

"In 1997, Arizona’s Maricopa County (which includes Phoenix) became the first government entity in the nation to post public records online. The decision to post a blizzard of records, including land purchases, election information, tax information, divorce cases and much more, garnered praise from the local press and won Maricopa a place in the Smithsonian’s prestigious National IT Innovation Collection. But it has come back to bite the county in a most unpleasant way: Maricopa now claims the highest rate of identity theft in the nation, and local IT officials say the two statistics are inextricably linked."  (from http://www.cio.com/article/16011).

Sure, the information is public record - but it always has been available to the public by visiting the county courthouses.  Now that it is online and available to anyone, anonymously, from anywhere in the world - there is huge increase in ID theft.  It's kinda hard to disregard that, or, compare it to buying stock or using email.

Best,
Robert A. Franco
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