About 5,000 taxpayers in Summit, Medina and Portage counties are among 50,000 in Ohio who are being notified that their personal information, including Social Security numbers, may be at risk after a backup DVD was discovered missing.
The missing DVD contains backup information of income tax documents submitted on or before June 2012 to the Regional Income Tax Agency of Ohio (RITA), which contracts with 254 cities and villages in Ohio for local income tax services. The DVD may have contained such personal information as name, address, Social Security number and possibly date of birth of about 50,000 individuals, which represents less than 2 percent of the tax accounts handled by RITA, the agency said.
In a recent news release, the agency said it discovered “that one DVD case was empty and the DVD missing” on Nov. 10, 2015, “while in the process of preparing a limited number of DVDs for secure destruction.”
The DVDs had been stored off-site at a third-party vendor’s secure facility, and were recalled to be securely destroyed by RITA, the agency said. RITA has moved to a more secure backup system, which no longer uses DVDs.
The agency said, “from our investigation, we believe the DVD was most likely destroyed in accordance with our usual process for unlabeled DVDs. If an unlabeled DVD is found, it is shredded and destroyed.”
The agency said it was in the process of providing written notice to affected individuals and would be providing free credit monitoring and identity protection for one year at no cost through Experian.
Regional Income Tax Agency Chief Legal Counsel Amy L. Arrighi said the information on the missing DVD was not limited to particular communities.
All member communities have been notified and many of the affected individuals have begun receiving their notices, Arrighi said.
“RITA will not contact impacted individuals about this event by telephone, email or social media,” she said.
Arrighi said some time lapsed between the discovery and notification so the agency could investigate.
“While we wanted to complete that investigation as quickly as possible we also needed to make sure that we were as thorough and diligent as possible,” she said.
In Summit, Medina and Portage counties, the agency contracts with the following communities: Boston Heights, Clinton, Hudson, Lakemore, Macedonia, Mogadore, New Franklin, Peninsula, Reminderville, Silver Lake, Tallmadge, Twinsburg, Wadsworth, Aurora, Hiram, Kent, Ravenna and Streetsboro. The Regional Income Tax Agency doesn’t serve any communities in Stark or Wayne counties.
The agency has posted frequently asked questions on its website: www.ritaohio.com.
Betty Lin-Fisher can be reached at 330-996-3724 or blinfisher@thebeaconjournal.com. Follow her @blinfisherABJ on Twitter or www.facebook.com/BettyLinFisherABJ and see all her stories at www.ohio.com/betty