Individuals who will be receiving a notice and identified as at risk include: Those who made requests for transcripts by mail or phone with credit card payments processed during the period of February 6, 2010, to June 30, 2010.
Those who made credit card payments by mail or phone of nonresident application fees processed during the period of February 6, 2010, to June 30, 2010, Those who registered by phone, mail, or fax for non-credit (continuing education) courses with credit card payment during the period of July 1, 2010, to November 3, 2010, and Those who requested a credit card payment refund by phone, mail, or fax for non-credit (continuing education) courses during the period of July 1, 2010, to November 3, 2010. On July 1, 2011, campus employees reported that boxes of paper files containing personal information were missing from a secured storage area.
These paper documents contained information necessary for processing of payments for official KCC business transactions, including some combination of name, address, phone number, social security number, and/or credit card information.
The records were being securely retained pursuant to state and university records retention policies (Administrative Procedure No. A8.450 Records Management, University of Hawaii and General Records Schedules, State of Hawaii Department of Accounting and General Services Archives Division) and there was no indication of forced entry.
The campus immediately began an internal investigation to attempt to locate the missing records and to identify the individuals whose records were in the boxes. The boxes were initially thought to have been moved by some authorized employee for official business. Subsequent interviews with employees and physical searches of storage rooms and offices failed to turn up the boxes.
A report was made to the Honolulu Police Department on July 8 and a Private Investigator was retained by the University to assist in this matter. Both investigations are still ongoing. At this time, there is no evidence that the documents were taken for malicious purposes; nonetheless, Kapiolani Community College takes this incident seriously and regrets that this has happened. The College is exploring a contract for credit monitoring services for affected individuals. The campus will be taking additional steps to ensure the safe handling and retention of physical records.
If you have questions about this recent incident or want information on how you can monitor your credit information and protect yourself from identity theft, go to http://www.kcc.hawaii.edu/object/idalert.html
See the original article at: KHON2 Local News
