EPISD Holds Identity Theft Seminar

Around a month ago that more than 70,000 students and employees in the El Paso Independent School District had their personal information hacked. Monday night the district organized an identity theft seminar for victims of the hack.

“Deter, detect, defend” that was the message the Federal Trade Comission gave to the EPISD parents and employees the idenitity theft seminar held at El Paso Community College on the East Side. Some parents weren’t satisfied with the presentation.

“I was hoping for first a presentation from the EPISD administration explaining the situation (and) what actions they took so that we all understood,” said mother Nadine Robele. “I was very disappointed the EPISD didn’t do the initial portion of the presentation “

EPISD invited the members of the south-west division of the FTC to come and speak, at no cost to parents. The district is still charging parents for a identity protection service, something Robele thinks should be free of charge.

“I think it should be totally paid for,” said Robele. Even though Experian is offering its anti-identity theft services at a 50% discount, Robele thinks it’s still too much for families that can’t afford an extra fee.

“As far as any potential for identity theft at 10 dollars a month I wanna know what rights there are for people who can’t afford 10 dollars a month,” said Robele.

The EPISD Associate Superintendent for Human Resources, Robert Almanzan, says despite some parents disappointment, there’s still a lot of knowledge to be gained about identity theft.

“I still think there are things that can get done,” said Almanzan. “Because we don’t know what happened with the data. Is there any abuse or misuse of that data?”

The FTC says there are still steps parents can take to sure the safety of their child’s social security number, even after a security breach:

1. Contact one of the three major credit reporting agencies 2. Close all accounts 3. Report the security breach to the police 4. File a complaint with the FTC

FTC Identity Theft Page: http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/microsites/idtheft/