Procurador mexicano investiga sobre Choice Point
Choice Point bloquea el acceso de base de datos de mexicanos
In June, the U.S. data company ChoicePoint reportedly blocked access to its database containing the personal information—including home addresses, passport numbers and even unlisted phone numbers—of 65 million voting-age Mexican citizens. The company, based in the Atlanta suburb of Alpharetta, Georgia, removed the data from its computers after the Mexican government complained that it probably came from the federal voter rolls, obtained illegally by a Mexican company and sold to ChoicePoint.
Choicepoint had already stirred controversy in the United States for its role in removing thousands of African American voters from the Florida voter rolls before the 2000 elections. But a major scandal erupted in Latin America after Associated Press reported last April that ChoicePoint had collected personal information on citizens of 10 Latin American countries and was selling it to U.S. law enforcement agencies.
Mexican authorities launched an official probe, and in May investigators asked ChoicePoint to send representatives to Mexico City. According to data analyst John Jordan, who was laid off from Choicepoint in June, the company refused, fearing its employees would be arrested. Instead, ChoicePoint met with officials at the Mexican consulate in Atlanta, where they handed over the electoral data.
In Mexico, federal investigators issued an arrest warrant for a fugitive believed to have sold the federal election records to a Mexican data firm, which resold the database to ChoicePoint. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and other U.S. law enforcement sources told AP they had prized Choicepoint's Mexican data—for which the U.S. government paid the company $1 million a year—because it allowed U.S. agents to run their own investigations in Mexico, without informing Mexican police.
Choicepoint has also backed out of Costa Rica and Argentina. ChoicePoint marketing director James Lee said the company still sells driver's license data on six million residents of Mexico City, and its business remains unaffected in the other seven Latin American countries where it still deals in data.
The governments of Colombia, Guatemala, Nicaragua and Costa Rica have all launched official investigations into the data sales to Choicepoint. In Colombia, the attorney general's office said it is trying to determine who copied and sold the data. But Mexico is the only country whose officials have actually contacted ChoicePoint, according to Lee.
Financial analysts say the scandal has had no discernible effect on Choicepoint stock, which has benefited from the government's increased push for personal information and background checks. (AP 8/31/03)
Last modified 2005-03-16 05:27 PM
