* Home * Dispatch.com * RSS * About Dispatch Politics Advertisement SEARCH: ________________ Go! * Today's Top Stories + RSS * Federal + Recent Stories + 7 day index + RSS * Ohio Government + Recent Stories + 7 day index + RSS * Central Ohio Government + Recent Stories + 7 day index + RSS * Daily Briefing Blog Error circulates state workers' bank data Saturday, February 6, 2010 3:11 AM By Alan Johnson THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH Personal banking information for 6,000 state employees, including Gov. Ted Strickland, was inadvertently included in a Jan. 27 e-mail distributed to dozens of payroll officers of state agencies. Republicans are calling it a security breach, but the Strickland administration says it was simply a mistake that posed little, if any, risk. "This was legally and technically not a data breach," said Ron Sylvester, spokesman for the Department of Administrative Services. "The data did not leave the state firewall. It was sent to state employees who are authorized to have regular access to personal information, such as Social Security numbers and bank accounts." The e-mail from an unnamed administrative- services employee included an attached spreadsheet listing 6,000 state employees whose bank accounts are to be moved from National City Bank, which was bought by PNC Bank. Two Republican state senators wrote to the Strickland administration this week saying the incident raises red flags, given past data breaches in state government. Sen. Keith Faber of Celina said he is concerned that administration employees "continue to be cavalier with the personal administration that has been entrusted to them." In a separate letter, Sen. Gary Cates of West Chester said he is "very disappointed at the apparent lack of discretion from DAS when handling such important information." Both senators called on the administration to take steps to prevent such incidents. Sylvester said the employee who sent the mistaken message fired off another e-mail within the hour notifying payroll officers. Further, recipients were directed in an e-mail sent the next day by Toni Brokaw, administrative services' interim deputy director in human resources, to delete the original message and send confirmation when they had done so. Brokaw also reminded the recipients about confidentiality requirements and warned that if they use or abuse such information, they could be "subject to civil and criminal penalties and/or discipline." Sylvester said the legislators "don't appear to have all of the facts in the case." "I don't want to downplay something serious like data protection," he said. "However, on a severity scale, this is relatively minor. The information that is sensitive is account and routing numbers, which are on the bottom of every check you hand to the grocery store or the gas station." Strickland spokeswoman Amanda Wurst confirmed that the governor was on the list of employees in the e-mail. She said the governor's office asked Administrative Services to ensure it is "following the privacy and security" procedures of the state. The issue is sensitive in state government because of a 2007 incident in which a data tape containing information on 1.3 million individuals, businesses and other entities was stolen from an intern's car. 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