When an individual applies for a job, there is usually some type of a pre-employment background check before the actual hire. According to reports from the Society of Human Resource Management (SHRM), more than 80 percent of U.S. businesses currently perform some form of background check. In a typical background check, applicants agree to give background check companies “Personally Identifiable Information” (PII) such as name, date of birth, and Social Security Number – all the information needed to commit identity theft.

What most job applicants  – and many Human Resources (HR) leaders – do not realize is that there is a strong likelihood that much of the Personally Identifiable Information collected during a background check will end up far beyond U.S. privacy laws, in a foreign call center or data processing location where there is little, if any, privacy protection.  The reason is because many background check companies routinely “offshore,” “repurpose,” or resell information from clients – without informing them – in order to cut costs and increase profits.

“Offshoring” – or offshore outsourcing – is the business practice of transferring jobs, services, and PII data to low-cost labor markets by using companies internationally for tasks formerly performed in house. “Repurposing” means to repurpose something – in this case Personally Identifiable Information – for use or to convert for use in another format or product: such as marketing purposes. The PII data can also be resold to skip tracers, lawyers, data aggregators, or marketing lists.

While offshoring, repurposing, and reselling data may help background check firms lower costs and increase profits, these activities bring greater risk to the Personally Identifiable Information  data of U.S. citizens in the form of identity theft. While many state and federal laws exist to protect PII data privacy – such as the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), Gramm-Leach-Bliley (GLB) Act, and Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) – all of these protections as a practical matter cease to exist once background check companies send Personally Identifiable Information out of the country.

While some countries outside of the U.S. have strong data and privacy protection laws, many places where Personally Identifiable Information is sent offshore for processing have little or no practical identity theft protection. As a result, American job applicants who have undergone background checks have no ability to enforce their privacy rights overseas. With little or no practical or cost-effective access to foreign courts, it is extremely difficult for a U.S. consumer to contact a foreign police department to lodge a complaint about identity theft or to obtain assistance for stolen PII.

The lack of any meaningful protection once Personally Identifiable Information is sent offshore is a major hurdle in the effort to combat identity theft and protect privacy. The challenge facing businesses such as background check companies today in the field of data privacy is how to share data when necessary while protecting each individual’s Personally Identifiable Information through effective data security and information security design.

Pre-Employ.com – a leading background check and employer service provider for Fortune 1000 companies – believes good data privacy and good data security equals good business. Pre-Employ.com’s data security policy keeps Personally Identifiable Information collected during background checks safe from corruption and suitably controls access, thus helping to ensure the privacy and protection of PII data. We believe Personally Identifiable Information belongs to the individuals providing the PII, and their privacy concerns are our privacy concerns.

HR leaders and decision makers would be wise to ask themselves the following questions:

• Does your background check provider practice offshoring Personal Identifiable Information (PII)?
• Does your background check provider resell PII data to skip tracers, lawyers, or marketing lists?
• Does your background check provider repurpose PII data for other uses like marketing purposes?
• Is your background check provider owned by a credit bureau or by data aggregators?

If your background check provider is Pre-Employ.com, the answer to all of these questions is NO. For more information about Pre-Employ.com’s background check services and Personally Identifiable Information (PII) privacy policy, please visit www.pre-employ.com, email info@pre-employ.com, or call 1-800-300-1821. To view a FREE data privacy webinar on demand, visit http://www.pre-employ.com/webinars/Data-Privacy-Webinars.aspx. To follow Pre-Employ.com on Twitter, visit http://www.twitter.com/PreEmploy.

Contact Us @ Pre-Employ.com

tahearn@pre-employ.com

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