The documents were intentionally placed on the Internet at the Hamilton County Courthouse in Cincinnati, where officials believed they were complying with Ohio's Open Records Act. 

A federal grand jury in Cincinnati on Feb. 15 issued a 51-page indictment that outlines the identity-theft conspiracy. 

It describes how the personal information of hundreds of Ohioans was abused by thieves who mined and pored through information from wide-open portals on Hamilton County's clerk of courts Web site. The Web site has now clamped down on access to more than 1 million documents. 

Before the scandal, everything from tax documents to medical records was automatically posted on the Internet if they surfaced in a criminal matter, land dispute, tax lien, civil lawsuit or traffic ticket. Even bank account balances and the account numbers went on the Internet when they appeared in domestic-relations materials. 

So far, seven of eight people charged with taking part in the conspiracy have been arrested, said Fred Alverson, a spokesman for the U.S. attorney in Columbus. None were government employees involved with the Web site. 

Alverson said in an interview that the government had not publicized the indictment before Thursday because suspects were still being rounded up. 

In response to the scandal, Hamilton County officials have restricted Internet access to more than 1.3 million records that had been available to anyone with the ability to surf the Web. 

Some 450,000 public documents containing Social Security numbers are blocked. 

In addition, 320,000 traffic tickets and 600,000 domestic-relations filings have been pulled from the court clerk's Web site over the past several months. 




The case is not directly related to the flap involving Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, whose office appears to have placed thousands of Social Security numbers on its Web site. 

But there is a parallel: Blackwell's records are also public documents compiled in the routine course of business. 

Critics contend Blackwell has exposed Ohioans to the possibility of identity theft, a threat that appears to have actually taken place in Hamilton County. 


Rox Axt, a U.S. Secret Service agent who investigated the Cincinnati incident along with Postal Service agents and police detectives in suburban Blue Ash, said in a court filing that the ring used stolen identities in Ohio, Kentucky, Michigan, Indiana, Georgia and Tennessee. He said they scammed banks and department stores with credit cards and checks. 

Sgt. Joe Boyatt, a Blue Ash detective who worked on the case, said the ring was operating by October 2004. He said members of the ring got the bulk of their information from the county Web site. 

"It was very pivotal in what they were doing, well over half of what they were doing," Boyatt said. 

He said the identity thieves fished for addresses, names and Social Security numbers "from middle-class and upper-middle-class areas. They could get everything they needed, date of birth, description, Social Security. 

It was a technology advance that was subject to abuse by the criminal element." 

The purpose of the county Web site - to make information widely available to the public - was well-intentioned, Boyatt added. 

"In this case, people just took advantage of it." 

Hamilton County Clerk of Court Greg Hartmann, who inherited the Web site from his predecessor in office, said many public records contain data that private citizens may want to keep private and off the Internet. 

"There's got to be a middle ground. I'm an advocate for public records. But we need to protect citizens from being victimized," said Hartmann, a Republican candidate for secretary of state. 

Hamilton County Probate Judge Jim Cissell, who launched the Web site in the late 1990s as clerk, said the scandal is the cost of living in an open society. 

"So what," Cissell said. 

"They steal identities from restaurant charges. They steal 'em right out of people's mailboxes. Every advancement that's ever occurred has reduced privacy." 

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