Fox 59 reported in December, 2023:
You don’t have a choice.
If you go to the Indiana Bureau of Motor Vehicles to apply for a license or register a car, you have to supply some personal information like your name, address, and age.
And the BMV can turn around and sell your information.
Indiana law permits the BMV to sell personal data and it’s a practice that goes back years but was first pointed out by FOX59/CBS4 in November 2021.
“I’ve heard from Hoosiers across this state that have followed your stories,” said State Senator Rodney Pol.
For two years, Pol introduced legislation to give Hoosiers a choice on whether their personal data was sold. But in 2022 and this year, the bills didn’t even get a committee hearing.
The business of selling data has been good for the BMV. A report released earlier this month estimates this year the agency will make $25.6 million from the sales.
That same report notes the money taken in pays for an array of things at the agency’s branches including salaries, lease payments, security, utility charges, and the purchase of new technologies.
It’s become such a common practice that now it becomes part of their operating budget.
said Pol.
What are frustrated Hoosiers to do?
Pol suggested reaching out to state lawmakers, because minus a change in state law the BMV will continue to have the option of selling customers data.
The WinePress reported earlier last month that Florida was recently caught doing the same thing. SEE: Florida DMV Caught Selling Resident’s Private Information To Third-Party Companies
Though seemingly very few want to stop this problem, one GOP candidate running for Indiana Governor this year has said that this is something he will seek to end, if elected.
Former Hoosier Attorney General Curtis Hill said that he will sign an executive order to get this banned should he win the 2024 election. Hill wrote in an op-ed for the Daily Caller, that the state has actually profited upwards of a quarter of a billion dollars since they have secretly been doing this; and highlights the overt dangers this presents, especially in the digital age of artificial intelligence.
He wrote (in part):
Over the past 10 years, the state has collected in excess of $250 million from the BMV selling customer personal information. And most Hoosiers had no idea.
As attorney general for Indiana, I was proud to stand up to criminals who profit from identity theft and data breaches. I took civil actions against a number of private companies — including a lawsuit against Equifax for a data breach resulting that affected 3.9 million Hoosiers. We settled with Equifax for nearly $20 million.
The sale of private, personal data by the government is an egregious breach of trust. We are only now learning exactly how much money the government has made off our data over the years — and it gets more startling by the day.
During several recent speaking engagements, I have brought up the BMV’s racket. Audiences are shocked at first — and then angry at the prospect of their state cavalierly selling off their data.
How is this any different from a data breach at a private company that puts millions of Americans at risk? Once this private information is sold and out of the government’s hands, there is no accountability for what happens to the data or where it goes.
At a time when the threat to our national security is at an all-time high and artificial intelligence (AI) is being used to maliciously manipulate the truth, Americans deserve to know that their government is protecting them. And they certainly deserve to know their government is not actively making things worse just to make a buck.
Your privacy and peace of mind should not be sold. You and your families should not be put in graver danger by a state agency’s reckless and uncaring policies.
In Indiana, our Republican governor and Republican-led general assembly are ignoring the privacy interests of hardworking Hoosiers. They are getting drunk on dollar signs — intoxicated by the prospect of how much money can be made by sticking it to the citizens they are supposed to serve.
This is not an issue Republicans should be surrendering to our political opponents. We should not be leaving it to Big Government Democrats to write the legislation that would stop government misuse of our private data.
I’m running for governor, and when I’m in the office, I will sign an executive order on day one prohibiting the Bureau of Motor Vehicles and all other state agencies from selling the personal, private data of Hoosiers without their consent.
Other states must follow suit, or else our national security will be at even greater risk.
It’s time to relieve the foxes of their henhouse-protection duties.
AUTHOR COMMENTARY
Thou sellest thy people for nought, and dost not increase thy wealth by their price.
Psalm 44:12
Slavery never went away; it just changed different forms. Granted, this is just theft when you get right down to it, but anything and everything anymore has a hidden price tag on it, and these wicked people will sell out to anyone for anything.
For I know your manifold transgressions and your mighty sins: they afflict the just, they take a bribe, and they turn aside the poor in the gate from their right.
Amos 5:12
The only reason why this has not gotten anywhere in the state courts, Congress and Senate, are for bribes and payoffs, and is the only reason that comes to mind; and probably some, if not a lot of that money, went into their pockets. Can’t prove that, but I would not be the least dismayed.
We know that Governor Holcomb is just another RINO, globalist, WEF shill; and the federal Senators and Representatives have repeatedly shown that they are just greedy dogs and thieves themselves:
SEE: US Congress And Senate Passes 1,000-Page Omnibus Bill No One Read, Costing Another $1.2 Trillion
An executive order to stop this sounds nice and all, but how about this novel concept: not only should it be banned, but the state cuts us a rebate check, with interest, for the dollar amount that ours and mine information was sold for! Hey, there’s an idea; but I’m sure they’ll have some excuse like, ‘oh, it’s not in the budget; oh, we’ll have to run at a deficit this year, and raise taxes elsewhere.’
[7] Who goeth a warfare any time at his own charges? who planteth a vineyard, and eateth not of the fruit thereof? or who feedeth a flock, and eateth not of the milk of the flock? [8] Say I these things as a man? or saith not the law the same also? [9] For it is written in the law of Moses, Thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn. Doth God take care for oxen? [10] Or saith he it altogether for our sakes? For our sakes, no doubt, this is written: that he that ploweth should plow in hope; and that he that thresheth in hope should be partaker of his hope. (1 Corinthians 9:7-10).
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The stupidity of all these nonsenses….. -_-