Data Brokers Can Fuel Violence Against Public Servants

It also has nothing to do with public employees which are completely different because we have the right to know that data about government employees. It allows us to protest outside of their homes. It allows us to investigate them for corruption and fraud. It allows us to enforce laws that require residency in order to hold certain positions. An open/transparent government means no secret employees allowed.

The rest of my reply reflects my understanding based on listening to my partner every day, who works in public records for the county where we live.

From what I've learned, public employees do seem uniquely vulnerable. Two employees (that we know about) have committed suicide in the past year or two; it was strongly suggested the pressure and harassment endured on the job was a factor.

- At any public-facing job (say, a restaurant server or customer support), are you legally required to respond to every single person? And in doing so, reveal your full, real name? Not required like "your employer wants you to" required, but LEGALLY required, like you can be sued if you don't? - If someone is making threats or clearly abusing the system intentionally, can you politely ask them to leave, trespass them, or just refuse to help them further? Or are you still required to help them anyway by law? - Are you obligated to help someone even if they're anonymous? - Are your own communications and employment details public records? - Are you legally obligated to allow anyone to come to your place of work, and be physically present, while you help them? - Are millions of people as angry at your employer as people generally are at "the government"?

Here are just a few of the things I've heard about the public records situation where we live:

- There are a handful of people who are infamous throughout the departments for abusing the system with dozens or hundreds of broad requests (and no, these aren't reporters or being doing interesting studies of anything). Some of these people are even disgruntled former employees or relatives of former employees, who are doing so purely for retaliation, because they know it will overload the system. But, the public records law is strong, so there is no provision for denying them access. The estimated time to fully complete some of these individuals' public records request is decades. As in, "we expect your final delivery of records to be complete in the year 2050." - Even after people receive their records, some pretend not to know how to read them purely to waste more time (like not knowing how to open a zip file - which every operating system does automatically - or a PDF). When an alternative is sent, they move on to the next excuse for not being able to read them. The law requires assisting these people, even if they're faking it. - Requestors frequently think they know the law better than the public employees serving them (and they're almost always wrong), and will heap all kinds of abuse on the records officers for perceived violations and incompetence. This abuse ranges from simple name calling, to threatening lawsuits, to sending employees their home address (in an "I know where you live" way as a veiled threat), to sending them the addresses of their parents, even to calling and harassing their parents. Can you imagine your parents being harassed because someone was unhappy with how you were doing your job? All while you were doing your job efficiently and correctly? - The law allows for the public to review physical records at the department in person, not just accept email/portal delivery. So, the enraged person threatening you and your family has a legal right to come hang out in your office with you. - The legal teams for said departments are extremely cautious about running afoul of the public records entitlement laws, or being perceived as retaliating, even if it means their employees are receiving threats and feel unsafe.

So, what to do? To me, it makes more sense for the solution to be on the job & "citizens' rights" side rather than the "protect employees from data brokers" side. Everyone should be more protected from data brokers. But public employees also deserve additional protection from malicious actors in the course of carrying out their duties - that is to say, yes, you have the right to request public records, but the government should have a lower tolerance for people abusing and system and acting maliciously.

I don't think that should be permissible.

> investigate them for corruption and fraud.

Why does that involve a home address? That sounds like stalking to me. I'm fairly certain that's explicitly illegal in any reasonable justification.

> enforce laws that require residency in order to hold certain positions.

Again, stalking. What are you going to do, stake the address out? If fraud regarding residency is suspected it can be investigated via official channels.

> An open/transparent government means no secret employees allowed.

Can't say I agree. Can't say I see "private home address" as equivalent to "secret employee".

This isn't entirely true, but insofar as some protest is aimed at intimidation, protest should be aimed at intimidating the government as a whole, not a specific individual, unless perhaps that specific individual is the government as a whole, in which case they'll probably have tanks guarding their palace from unruly protestors and this discussion is moot.

> I'd absolutely support anyone protesting something I agree with

Even in a mob with 500 torches and pitchforks outside your family's house?

> There are no special rights given to "journalists" that aren't already given to all people. Journalists are just regular people and everyone has the freedom of the press.

This is correct in a technical sense but not really correct in a reality sense. Journalists are not privileged with legal rights, but they absolutely have many special social rights. Journalists are given access to places regular people would not be given access to all the time, and people are willing to talk to and divulge information to journalists that they would not be willing to give to random individuals. For an established journalist, it would be trivial to obtain a politician's address even if it were not public record. This social trust is earned by a record of professionalism.

> There are extremely few public servants being assassinated in their homes. There are far more cases of public servants killing innocent people.

The latter statement seems like a non-sequitur. It is true, but not really connected to the topic at hand. Knowing a politician's address doesn't stop them from killing people. It simply results in more total killing in the world, not less. We should strive to reduce all sources of senseless violence, and giving out politician's addresses is absolutely one of those sources.