On Fri, Dec 4, 2009 at 5:29 AM, Jorge Amodio <jmamodio@gmail.com> wrote:
I'm more concerned about information that by law is being made public and available on-line (like property records in the US) out of my control, or not very easy to "opt-out".
Property records have always been public information in the US, and no one can "opt out" (well, I suppose you could sell your house). Having information like this available to the public is important because the government uses those records to make decisions like property tax rates. If you were allowed to opt out it would be difficult or impossible for the public to monitor these government actions. For example, if you thought that you were being charged more property tax than you thought you should you could examine the property records for properties that were comparable to yours and see what they were being charged. If all of your neighbors had opted out you wouldn't be able to do that (at least not with out going to court). Similarly, if you were looking at buying a house you could check the property records to see if any liens had been made against the property or if you could afford to pay the property taxes. -- Jeff Ollie