Reports surfaced briefly a week or so ago about an "investigation" by a vaguely identified Congressional panel who had discovered some surprisingly large payments to commercial "investigating services" by the Federal spy agencies, and collateral information indicated quite common use of the same or similar sources by multiple state and local police agencies. The information obtained appeared to be mostly the common stuff like name, address, phone number, credit reports, social security number, drivers license number, etc.

The real point of the "discovery" was testimony attributed to at least one operator of one of these services who openly and freely admitted using illegal methods in obtaining the information being sold.

The testimony appears to have delved into descriptions of methods, and presented an extremely poor view of the level of respect for personal information by sources who might have such information legitimately but are obligated to prevent such release except under specific conditions. This was especially true at public agencies (courts, utility companies, etc.) who might have legal cause to have information but who easily and readily "handed out" information with little regard for existing restrictions on such release, often based on obviously false/fraudulent identification¹ of the recipitents and fraudulent justification for the requests.

¹ "I tell them I'm her mother and I haven't heard from her, and they'll nearly always give me what I ask for."

There also were discussions by several witnesses as to the widespread use of similar methods by "many such commercial investigation agencies," and the "very common appearances" of police departments as "customers."

Testimony varied as to whether the police were charged the same as any other person who asked, with several agencies indicating they provided information "at no cost" when requested by law enforcement agencies or by individuals associated with² an enforcement agency.

² "I just make up a name and tell them I'm a cop on a local force, and they'll give me the stuff over the phone."

The existence of such private snoop agencies, and the common use of fraudulent and sometimes criminal methods in collecting information should surprise no one. The purchase of information from them by law enforcement, without questioning the legality of their methods was questioned as a "moral issue" in the article; but most of the purchasers thought that a "don't ask" policy was sufficient.

Original newspaper report(s) gave little "traceability" and I expected to see further comment; but none has thus far appeared.

It does appear that people who "do it for money" may be even better at it, or at least at some aspects of it, than the government snoops. It also should be noted that with these agencies there is no verification of information and no recourse if false information³ is given.

³ Not much different than when a government agency collects it directly in secret?

John