N.J. Lawmakers: ‘Wipe Clean Those Copiers!’

Two New Jersey lawmakers have unveiled legislation that would require that the hard drives of all digital copy machines in New Jersey be wiped clean of data before the copiers are discarded or transferred to another user.

The legislation, which State Sen. Bob Smith and Assemblywoman Linda Greenstein are planning to introduce next week, follows recent news reports that detailed how much personal and financial data remains embedded on most modern digital copiers  — unbeknownst to users — after an individual or business sells a copier, or returns it at the end of a lease period. Smith’s and Greenstein’s proposed legislation was detailed in a report at newjerseynewsroom.com.

Most digital copy machines use internal hard drives, which store the tens of thousands of documents that have been scanned, printed, faxed or emailed by the machines. Those embedded documents can include people’s Social Security numbers, tax information, bank account numbers and other information that thieves can use for identity fraud.

And many copier users, not understanding how the documents are stored, have not erased any of the data before they got rid of their copiers. (The issue was explored in-depth in Identity Theft 911’s June newsletter.)

The Smith-Greenstein bill calls for anyone knowingly violating provisions of the bill to pay a penalty of up to $10,000 for the first offense and up to $20,000 for subsequent offenses.

The legislation also would allow anyone who suffers damages as a result of a violation to sue the responsible party and recover actual and punitive damages.

Smith and Greenstein say they also are introducing a resolution in the New Jersey Legislature to urge Congress to enact similar federal legislation.