Planned database sale worries Iowans.

• Author: Swartz, Nikki
• Position: UP FRONT

The information contained in a public records website--including the Social Security numbers of thousands of Iowans--may soon be sold to a real estate database company. Iowans and privacy experts fear the move may result in identity theft.

The site, IowaLandRecords.org, contains home mortgage records and other documents from each of the state's 99 counties, It is run by the Iowa County Recorders Association, a group of county officials who electronically post hundreds of thousands of public documents from the counties.

The recorders association website is a valuable resource to the real estate industry and to Iowans, Joyce Jensen, chairwoman of the Iowa Land Records governing board, told The Des Moines Register. She said that value diminishes when information is restricted.

Earlier this year, the recorders association negotiated selling its large database and ongoing updates to Data Tree, a company that manages more than four billion records nationwide. According to The Register's research, Data Tree would have paid an estimated $11,750 a month for the information.

But recorders association officials agreed to temporarily halt the sale earlier this year after lawmakers expressed concern, a spokesman for the association said. Lawmakers have set up an interim committee, partly to review the possible sale, that will meet in November.

The recorders association's website costs roughly $700,000 a year to run, The Register said. It's paid largely by a $1 fee for documents that are recorded. In addition, most counties allocate $2,000 a year from their local budgets for the project. The unsigned agreement would prohibit Data Tree from disclosing confidential information to any third party.

The nearly $12,000-a-month...