Personally Identifiable Information (PII) Essay

Personally Identifiable Information (PII) refers to randomness that can be utilize to distinguish or trace an individuals identity, either alone or when feature with other person-to-person or identifying information that is linked or linkable to a specific individual. 1 PII can admit but is not limited to a full name, an address, a home, situation or mobile telephone numbers, an email address, a social shelter number or other form of national ID number, an Internet protocol address or a fingerprint or other biometric entropy . Non-PII can become PII whenever additional information is made available that when combined with existing information, could be habitd to identify an individual.Most people striket give a second thought to the information they argon occupyed to provide when using ecommerce sites or creating accounts on various sites such as Facebook and Twitter. What is the data you entered being used for? What happens to this information once you have entered it a nd spotless your transaction with a business? How is this information stored and for how long? How is my information protected from theft? Will my information be sold to 3rd parties? What atomic number 18 my rights should my private data be lost or compromised? These be questions everyone should ask because your information in the wrong hands can be used to steal your money, steal your identity or both.According to the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, from April 2005 to April 2012 there were 3,062 data let ones nationwide shineing more than 546,000,000 PII records . Businesses have an ethical and effectual obligation to protect your PII. Not only will a breach and subsequent loss of data cost businesses money, it will also affect their reputations. When collecting and storing PII businesses must set policies on how the data is received, accessed, stored, transmitted and released to third parties. Protecting PII involves a combination of only collecting and storing data that i s take to complete the task or transaction at hand, using encoding to store and transmit data, data-loss prevention and policy training and compliance . alas there are not many standardized laws outside of the health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)2 exist that address the collection, storage and use of PII. There are even contrary standards among states when it comes to the notification of security breaches involving personal information. Forty-six states, the District of Columbia, Guam, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands each have different legislation dealing with notification of the theft of PII.Businesses have to ensure they are aware of the various Federal and State laws dealing with PII. They must ordinate corporate policies and train their employees in the collection, handling, processing, storage and transmission of PII. Individuals must be vigilant and read the privacy policies of companies they do business with on-line so they are aware of what ca n and will be done with their personal information.