Gerald Kleczka: “last week the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Franks] and I introduced H.R. 1813, the Personal Information Privacy Act, a…”

“last week the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Franks] and I introduced H.R. 1813, the Personal Information Privacy Act, a bipartisan bill to safeguard individual privacy. This legislation is a companion to the Feinstein-Grassley bill, S. 600. The Kleczka-Franks bill will prevent credit bureaus, Departments of Motor Vehicles and other commercial users, including those using the Internet, from giving out Social Security numbers and other personal information. A Social Security number alone gives a criminal access to one's medical, financial, credit, and educational records, as many of my constituents have found out the hard way. Thousands of people are victimized every year by identity fraud. In the first 6 months of this fiscal year, the Social Security Administration logged almost 4,900 allegations of Social Security number fraud. That is up from about 2,400 in the entire fiscal year 1996. I urge my colleagues to sign on as cosponsors of the Personal Information Privacy Act. We owe it to the citizens of this country to protect them from one of the fastest growing crimes in the country.”