Page 3 - March 2021 TTI

The Legislative Threat is Real

by Keith Oakley

During this session of the Texas Legislature, licensed children, theft, insurance fraud and other crimes cannot
investigators in Texas are facing the possibility of the be conducted without access to the vital data in
greatest loss of access to public information since the question.
formation of TALI back in 1971.
TALI is not alone in this fight. Many companies
The Legislature is responding to recent data breach conduct preemployment checks on their employees,
where Vertifore, a provider of insurance software, drivers and even volunteers. Many Insurance
disclosed that a third party had accessed the details of companies cannot stay in business without driver
27.7 million Texas Drivers. information. Law enforcement agencies even use
privately owned data bases for their investigations.
The incident is believed to have taken place sometime
between March 11 and August 1, and happened as a We will be asking all TALI members to contact their
result of human error when three data files were legislators in the coming weeks to let them know that
inadvertently stored in an unsecured external storage Licensed Investigators use this public information only
device. for approved purposes. We will support legislation
designed to punish individuals that use the information
As a result of the public outrage over the data breach, illegally, but not bills that take this vital information
there have been several bills filed to end access to most away from the good guys.
public data held by state agencies. The two bills that
have garnered the most support at this point seem to be
Senate Bill 15, by Senator Robert Nichols, (R-
Jacksonville) and Senate Bill 16, by Senator Jane
Nelson, (R-Flower Mound). Both bills have received
priority status in the Senate.

S.B. 15 limits access to all public information held by
the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles, The Texas
Department of Public Safety and the Texas Department
of Transportation.

S.B. 16 limits access to all public information held by
all state agencies, including any department,
commission, board, office, council, authority, or other
agency in the executive, legislative, or judicial branch of
government, including a university system or WWW.PATTERSON-PATTERSONPI.COM
institution of higher education, without written
consent of the individual that is subject of the DOUGLAS W. PATTERSON
information. PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR / PROCESS SERVER
835 E. LAMAR BLVD., STE 301
ARLINGTON, TX 76011
TALI is working to educate Legislators to the fact that
that this information is needed for the safety of Texans.
l
214-859-4996 [email protected]
Investigations into voter fraud, missing and exploited STATE OF TEXAS LICENSE #A18683
THE TEXAS INVESTIGATOR MARCH 2021 | 1