According to ARMA International, a professional organization for information governance workers, business and government officials have to follow increasingly complex rules to keep the data of their customers and clients safe. Personal data is compromised at alarmingly high rates. For example, according to the ARMA 2008 report "Requirements for Personal Information Protection, Part 1: U.S. Federal Law," more than 79 million records were compromised in 2007 (Identity Theft Resource Center). This report states that the "most overused" personal information is people's Social Security Number. Federal laws such as the 1974 Privacy Act state that privacy is a personal and fundamental right given in the Constitution, so this is incredibly problematic.
Given the high rate at which personal information is compromised and citizens' rights to privacy, the United States should pass additional laws to protect personal information. For example, employers or entities granting loans can access private information in credit reports. In addition, while the federal government grants citizens a right to privacy, states, with the exception of California, do not grant citizens the same rights. Therefore, state laws need to recognize an individual's right to privacy.
Personal information related to one's health deserves particular protection because, if someone has damaging health information, it can be used against them in prejudicial ways, such as in employment, housing, loans, or education decisions. While The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) passed in 1996, this law does not always protect people's personal health information because people have to access this information with identifiers such as their Social Security Numbers. Therefore, people's health information is stored alongside other personal information. At the very least, patients should be given a new identifier to access their health information, and this data should not be stored with one's Social Security Number.
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