RICHMOND--Legislators have introduced a slew of privacy-related bills this year.
Many of them deal with requirements to remove personal information from documents that could be public under the Freedom of Information Act.
A search of the state's legislative Web site shows 64 bills relating in some way to privacy issues, including one that would ensure the anonymity of those who carry out state executions.
Even more bills relate to the FOIA.
But most privacy bills this year seem related to the growing problem of identity theft, and are aimed at preventing identity thieves from finding targets within government and court documents.
For example, there's a bill to remove Social Security numbers from court documents and land records. Another would remove Social Security numbers from voter records before those records are sold to anyone in another state. A third just makes it generally illegal to make publicly available someone else's Social Security number, even if the number was gotten from public documents.
Sponsors of some of the bills said privacy issues, especially identity theft, are becoming more and more important to constituents, who then take their worries to lawmakers.
"People are very, very concerned about identity theft," said Sen. Jeannemarie Devolites Davis, R-Vienna. "It's becoming more of a populist issue. The Internet is what's raising the issue."
Devolites Davis has a bill that says Social Security numbers cannot be used on land records after 2010, and that the FOIA does not apply to land records available over the Internet through a "secure remote access" program.
Devolites Davis said the rise of online activity is driving privacy concerns; before the Internet, someone interested in identity theft had to go to an office and face a real person to get government documents.
Sen. Ken Cuccinelli, R-Fairfax, has legislation that would exempt from public view the portions of records that contain identifying information about a person, including Social Security numbers, credit card numbers, date of birth, signatures or other such information.
Cuccinelli, like Devolites Davis, said privacy issues resonate with constituents, and they've been asking him to do something.
The more technology advances, he said, "the more important it is to defend the information" coveted by identity thieves.
"That's only going to increase," Cuccinelli said.
He said government is still trying to determine how much time and money to spend on making data safe.
"Somewhere there's a balance," Cuccinelli said.
But, he added, it is government's responsibility to try to protect personal information, and he doesn't think that violates the spirit of the FOIA.
"Nobody has a right to everybody else's Social Security number," Cuccinelli said. "Nobody has a right to everybody's date of birth."
Closer to home, Stafford County has requested a bill that would remove names, addresses, phone numbers and other identifying information from e-mails to elected officials.
The bill is being sponsored by House Speaker Bill Howell and Sen. John Chichester. Both are Republicans representing Stafford County.
Howell said the bill was requested by a Stafford supervisor, who was surprised to find that "what he considered to be private correspondence" via e-mail was actually a public document under the FOIA.
"It's a logical, specific exemption," Howell said.
Other bills would let consumers put a freeze on their credit reports if they think they are victims of identity theft, something many other states are doing.
Of course, sometimes it's the government that loses personal data.
There have been several reports in recent months of government laptops or disks with thousands of people's personal information being lost or stolen.
Gov. Tim Kaine last week announced an executive directive to the state Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services to study ways to enhance consumer privacy.
He also signed an executive order to the state secretary of technology to review state agency data-security policies.
Kaine said a recent audit of those policies concluded that state agencies could do a better job of protecting data.
"We have security standards in place," Kaine said. "We must make sure they are appropriate and that they are rigorously enforced to protect against accidental access and deliberate hacking as well."
To reach CHELYEN DAVIS:
Email: cdavis@freelancestar.com