I should have known the Internet would spawn a RapSheets.com, but I confess it took me a while to grasp the scary part of putting digital dossiers online.
A few weeks ago, RapSheets.com began selling national criminal background checks for $20 to $30 a pop. The tiny Tennessee firm claims its new criminal directory is the most comprehensive on the Internet, encompassing 50 million criminal records in 36 states (it includes Virginia but not Maryland or the District).
RapSheets.com is among a new breed of info-brokers racing to roll up public records into mega-databases, and then using the Internet to sell personal information that historically has been hard to access.
RapSheets.com, which got its start providing some local criminal records, is ramping up at a time when background checks by employers are skyrocketing, propelled by security fears in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
In addition to criminal files, all sorts of records -- bankruptcies, divorces and civil lawsuits -- are moving online into interconnected databases that allow searching in ways never before possible.
While this may be a boon for employers, privacy advocates worry that law and public policy in the United States are failing to keep up with technology advances in order to adequately protect people from mistakes and misuse.
"People's careers can be and are being ruined by information that may well be erroneous or misinterpreted or taken out of context," said Peter Scharf, founder of the Center for Society, Law & Justice at the University of New Orleans. "If we don't do something, we are going to have a digital underclass of people who will not pass the quantitative screens of character."
Of all the data moving online, criminal records are among the most sensitive. They traditionally have been hard to access because they are kept locally in different formats by thousands of agencies. The federal government maintains a national database but limits access to law enforcement officers.
The Internet's cheap distribution system is allowing companies to buy records from counties and states and unify them in central repositories. Some are even selling them back to the government.
RapSheets.com recently sold access to its criminal database to FedLink, the federal government's secure private network, so government employees can run database searches on it.
To be sure, the inexpensive criminal searches offered by RapSheets and competitors are a godsend for employers, especially smaller ones that couldn't afford traditional background services because screeners tend to charge hefty fees to send runners to local courthouses.
While many firms are offering online criminal searches, RapSheets.com appears to be the first national player to open its criminal database for purposes other than employment and tenant screening.
"Our service is a tool not only for corporate users but also for people who want to check out the background of their babysitters or neighbors," said Peter Schutt, president of Memphis-based RapSheets.com. "If your daughter was going out on a date with someone for the first time, there is no reason you can't check the guy out."
To be clear, some rules do apply to criminal background checks. Anyone running a criminal check for employment or credit screening, for instance, is required by the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act to obtain the applicant's written consent and notify the applicant if a job or credit is denied him or her based on the results. RapSheets also requires a date of birth for the person being searched to reduce the likelihood of mistaken identity.
RapSheets and other info-brokers also require customers to check an online box pledging to honor the Fair Credit Reporting Act. But in reality, RapSheets, with nine employees, has no way to verify how people use the data once they've bought it. Moreover, the federal act doesn't apply if criminal records are being searched for personal reasons.
Many of RapSheets' competitors have shied from selling criminal data directly to consumers. National Background Data, which has amassed a database with 40 million conviction records from 32 states, only wholesales its data to other screening companies. It began offering those companies the ability to do a unified national criminal search in November.
But I sense the industry's restraint may not last, and that RapSheets is on the cusp of something big and worrisome.
The biggest employment screening company, ChoicePoint Inc., says it will start selling criminal record searches to consumers soon through a Web portal called KnowX.com. It already sells such information to businesses through ScreenNow.com.
The KnowX site currently lets consumers search databases containing records of bankruptcies, liens, civil lawsuits, professional licenses, marriages and divorces. David Cook, vice president of ChoicePoint's Workplace Solutions group, said that when criminal records are added, KnowX won't allow consumers to search criminal files just to check out neighbors or dates. The idea is to let them screen nannies, lawn-care and other household workers.
"It will not be able to be done without that individual's consent," Cook said.
ChoicePoint has a mountain of data to analyze. The 5,000-employee company, which was spun off from former parent Equifax in 1997, has been on an acquisition binge, buying nearly three dozen companies in the past few years, including 11 involved in employment screening. ChoicePoint says it now owns an amazing 14 billion records about people and companies.
Author Richard Hunter paints a scary portrait of how the information transparency is likely to impact society in his new book, "World Without Secrets."
"It's going to be extremely difficult for companies as well as individuals to keep any secrets in this new environment," Hunter said in an interview. "It's critically important that as a society, we come to an understanding about what are and are not legitimate uses for the information these companies are gathering about individuals."
Leslie Walker's e-mail address is walkerl@washpost.com.
