14 DAY TRIAL // In an attempt to increase popularity among constituents and in the spirit of transparency of his work as Florida Governor, Jeb Bush released to the public a massive cache of emails that included unredacted personal information.
The emails have been published on his website where they are organized by time period and can be downloaded in their original Outlook (PST) format.
Confidential info is exempt from public disclosure
The confidential details were available in the clear and included social security numbers, dates of birth, phone numbers, email addresses, health care identification numbers, and home addresses.
Even if a governor’s correspondence while in office is considered to be public record, and can be requested by anyone, sensitive data is protected by law and its public disclosure is prohibited as it can be used in malicious activities against its owners.
Chapter 119 of Florida’s “Sunshine” law, which refers to public records, is quite clear on the fact that confidential information has to be redacted when it is made available for public viewing.
“In the spirit of transparency, I am posting the emails of my governorship here. Some are funny; some are serious; some I wrote in frustration,” Bush wrote on his website, completely unaware of the security implications of the dump.
Emails are still available on the website
After news about the blunder hit media outlets, the collection of emails, which is estimated at hundreds of thousands, has been taken down, although plenty of people had already downloaded it and initiated an analysis of the personal information it contained.
Trying to download any part of the email archive, which is split into six pieces, now generates an error message informing that the page included raw PST files from the Florida Department of State. “We were informed that some personal information was available in the raw data so we removed these files,” the message reads.
On the other hand, someone could still find personally identifiable information because the emails are also available through a calendar link, where they can be accessed by the days they were received between 1999 and 2007, and not all of them have been cleaned of the sensitive data.
“You may still read these emails on the email calendar link, where we have redacted personal information we have been able to locate,” the message added.
Ran a few tools over the Jeb Bush emails. And...yeah. Pages of SSNs, DOBs, CCNs in the output. pic.twitter.com/7CxpWlHDUM
— kamwoods (@kamwoods) February 10, 2015
