By Xander Landen/VTDigger
The Vermont Department of Motor Vehicles has been quietly selling the personal data of Vermonters to private companies since at least 2004.
The state agency has made more than $15 million on sales of the data over the past four years, and the practice has raised privacy concerns.
State records show the DMV has given approval to 700 companies and government agencies to purchase or receive personal data about drivers.
In 2015, the DMV made $3.4 million selling the information. From 2016 to 2018, the department brought in $4 million each year. Information about data sales in previous years was unavailable.
DMV officials say the vast majority of the revenue comes from insurance companies and businesses who buy information about their employees’ driving histories.
However, the department has also allowed law firms, private investigators and out-of-state corporations to buy or access personal information about Vermont drivers, including where they live, the cars they drive, their driving records and their criminal histories.
In the past 15 years, the state has allowed 50 private investigation firms to buy driver data, according to a list of the companies the state authorized to purchase the information.
The list also includes a handful of out-of-state companies like Deloitte, an accounting giant, and “the world’s largest consulting firm,” Choicepoint Service Inc., a data aggregator that was bought by risk management and corporate research firm LexisNexis. Another firm, Aristotle Inc., specializes in “identity and age verification solutions” for the government and private sector.
The personal data the state sells includes information on licenses and vehicle registrations.
The database shows where people live, what cars are registered to them, whether they have criminal records, and their driving histories.
The only information it won’t provide on any condition is driver medical information and Social Security numbers, according to DMV officials. Photographs are also not for sale.
Vermont isn’t the only state whose DMV sells driver information — the practice is reportedly common across the country.
Federal law requires DMVs to provide driver information to government agencies, and sell it to certain businesses including trucking firms, insurance agencies, and vehicle manufacturers.
It also gives states discretion to sell the information to other companies.
The Vermont DMV’s operations director, Michael Smith, said the department follows federal regulations and reviews each request for personal information on an individual basis.
“We collect, and residents of Vermont entrust us with their personal identification and information and we take that very, very seriously,” Smith said.
“We don’t just let anybody have it. We let those that are deemed to have a permissible use have access to the information that is permissible for them to use.”
VTDigger analyzed a list of the roughly 700 companies authorized to purchase data from the Vermont Department of Motor Vehicles since 2004.
The majority of the names on the list obtained by VTDigger include government agencies, local businesses, and private law firms.
While the DMV will sell personal information to some private entities, it refuses to sell to others.
