A disturbing security breach

Any form of identity theft is problematic. But to lift the Social Security numbers, bank statements and other personal information of people applying for food stamps, financial aid, child-care subsidies and government medical programs is despicable.

Anyone who has experienced identity theft can attest that it is highly expensive and nearly impossible to undo the damage that can occur when someone has access to one's bank accounts or uses personal information to obtain loans or credit cards. If someone's income is so limited that they qualify for government programs, they will face extreme difficulty unraveling such a mess.

"It's a particularly gross crime," said U.S. attorney for Utah Brett Tolman in announcing federal indictments against four Utahns — including a woman employed on and off in the state Department of Workforce Services, where the identity thefts allegedly occurred. The woman had access to a database containing the personal information of some 1,775 people. "Gross crime" is an understatement.

These indictments come on the heels of two other high-profile incidents of employees snooping through records. Earlier this year, officials at the U.S. State Department learned that employees had accessed the passport files of a number of powerful Americans, among them presidential candidates Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John McCain. The snooping was not politically motivated but, rather, garden-variety snooping by idle employees, agency officials said. Regardless, there's no excuse for it. People who have access to such records have a specific duty to read them for official purposes only.

But at a time when security of sensitive government records should be iron-clad, Americans learned this past week that Internal Revenue Service computers have such poor controls that disgruntled employees, agency contractors or outside hackers could steal taxpayers' confidential information.

Taxpayers at all levels deserve far better. Any time they provide personal information to a government agency they should have confidence that the information will be used for its intended purpose and that it will be properly secured. Sadly, these are three recent examples in which the public confidence has been betrayed. All levels of government must strive for better control of this information and enforce policies that ensure sensitive information is handled with the utmost care.