Legal Requirements for Shredding Documents

Protect your Privacy!

Consumer privacy has become such a serious issue that federal and California state legislation has been enacted to protect our privacy. There are several laws that require businesses to destroy rather than simply discard personal information. The legal shredding services of Southern California Shredding help our clients follows each of these laws and guidelines.

CALIFORNIA: Bill 2246

Assembly Bill 2246 went into effect in January of 2001 with the following mandate:

“A business shall take all reasonable steps to destroy or arrange for the destruction of a customer’s records within its custody or control containing personal information which is no longer to be retained by the business by (1) shredding, (2) erasing, or (3) otherwise modifying the personal information in those records to make it unreadable or undecipherable through any means.”

FEDERAL: HIPAA

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 is one of the first and most well know of the laws. Security standards were set that establish measures to ensure the security of healthcare information maintained by healthcare providers, healthcare institutions as well as health insurance companies. This information must be properly destroyed by shredding, as burning is illegal in California.

Gramm-Leach Bliley Act

Also known as the GLB Act, this law places significant restrictions on the use of customer information by those in the financial industry (insurance, banks, securities, mortgage, escrow, lenders, etc.). Such financial institutions must disclose their privacy policies to their customers.

FACTA

The Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act establishes a national system of fraud detection so victims can alert all three major credit rating agencies with a single phone call. Starting June 1, 2005, employers must destroy personal information about their employees before they throw it out if they obtained the information from a credit report.

US SUPREME COURT

Ruled (California vs. Greenwood) that “Dumpster Diving” is not illegal. “Dumpster Diving” is the predominate method of obtaining information by those involved in crimes related to:

• Identity Theft
• Telephone Fraud
• Computer Hackers
• Credit Card Fraud
• Industrial Espionage

Southern California Shredding provides fully compliant document and hard drive destruction in San Diego, Orange County, and other Southern California communities. Call us to learn how our services can help you follow these privacy laws.