Relates to the fees that may be charged by a county clerk's office

Section 2 adds a new subdivision 1-g to §333 of the Real Property Law to require recording officers to reject any conveyance which contains a driver's license number, credit card account number, bank account number, a complete date of birth or more than four digits of a social security number.

Section 3 adds a new §8021-a to the Civil Practice Law & Rules establishing a statewide uniform cover page fee of 510 except in Erie County where it shall be $15.

Section 4 is the effective date.

Justification

Identity theft is a serious problem nationally which has increased dramatically since the advent of the Internet According to a recent report by the Better Business Bureau, there were nearly 9 million victims of identity theft in 2005. The average victim spends more than 40 hours recovering from this crime. The County Clerk's office is the official repository of many documents, ranging from deeds and mortgages, to all records of Supreme and County courts, to tax liens and warrants. Except for certain sealed court records, these filed and recorded documents have always been readily available to the public in their offices. To a resourceful criminal these papers represent a treasure trove of information. The United States government has for many years filed tax warrants in every County Clerk's office and with the Secretary of State, and has until recently included the complete social security number of the tax delinquent on the warrant. Decades of court records have used an individual's birth date and/or their home address as an aid to identifying that specific person. Until this past year (when the County Clerks of New York and the State's Attorney-General successfully campaigned to change the law) military discharges recorded by veterans were accessible by anyone, though all of these contain the veteran's social security number.

In every County Clerks' office, an infinitesimal number of publicly recorded mortgages have been found to contain personal identification information placed there by the financial institution which originated he mortgage, either inadvertently or deliberately. These documents, generally a dozen or more pages of dense type, are not scrutinized word-for-word by the County Clerk's office when submitted; indeed, if the document appears "correct as to form" and is accompanied by the proper fee, the Clerk has no choice but to record it. Twenty years or more ago, when many of these mortgages were recorded, the present security concern over social security numbers and dates of birth within public documents did not even exist.

While there has never been a single demonstrated instance where County Clerk records (either online or inside the Clerk's office) were used to steal someone's identity, the potential for such misuse exists and is a growing concern for the general public and the Legislature. County Clerks have made great progress in preserving their records and in improving access to them in recent decades. Microfilm has long been used in most counties to accomplish these goals, and increasingly Clerks are relying on electronic imaging for these purposes. The increased use of imaging has led County Clerks nationwide to further improve public access to these public documents by making them available over the Internet. While sealed records remain sealed (and unavailable online), the movement to make unsealed public records more and more accessible is gaining momentum, with an increasing number of records repositories allowing online access, which has been favorably received by the press and public. At present, some County Clerks in New York State provide free online access to some or all of their records; others charge either a subscription fee or a per-item fee for such access; however, a majority do not yet provide any Internet access.

By requiring County Clerks to reject documents which contain unnecessary personal identifying information, they can continue to provide the greatest access to the greatest number of records while significantly reducing the risk of misuse of the information in the documents. In addition, and equally as important, establishing a uniform statewide standard cover page fee would provide revenue to enable County Clerks to invest in new technologies, update computers, add staff to comply with the new processing requirements of this legislation and offset recent state actions which have reduced County Clerk revenues. Also, this measure would eliminate confusion that currently exists as a result of different Clerk's offices charging varying fees when they attach a cover page to recorded documents. Under this legislation, County Clerks which are not authorized or required to impose a cover page fee would be exempt from the provisions of this act.

Prior legislation history

2006: Senate 3rd Reading Calendar/Assembly Local Governments Committee. 2007-08: Senate Local Government Committee/Assembly Local Governments Committee

Fiscal implications

None to the state. It is anticipated that the requirement that documents be rejected will demand additional staff hours to process and properly identify documents to be declined. The fee authorized in the bill is expected to more than offset the additional staff costs.

Effective date

This-act shall take effect on the first of September next succeeding the date on which it shall have become a law.