Why Home Depot is Paying Nearly $28 million in a Civil Settlement Involving Discarded Customer Records and Hazardous Materials – Mobile Record Shredders

Home Depot's parent organization was ordered to pay $27.8 million to the province of California and a few other southern California governments in a civil agreement for issues with hazardous waste disposal practices and customer records that were not discarded correctly.

The Riverside “Environmental Protection Team” of the County Prosecutor and regulators all through the state-led an assessment of 45 waste compactors belonging to 32 Home Depot stores in the time frame of 2013 and 2015.

They discovered the waste was discarded improperly, including pesticides, solvents, batteries and other poisonous materials. The 45 compactors also contained customer records that had names, addresses, telephone numbers and email addresses. The records had not been shredded or disposed of properly, as per a statement from the prosecuting attorneys’ office.

Home Depot has made strides towards compliance with environmentally friendly waste disposal practices and appropriate disposal of customer documents.

The case was documented a month ago in Alameda County, and the agreement includes $1.8 million in fines and civil costs; $2.5 million to back eco-friendly protection projects, and a cost of in any event $6.8 million from Home Depot to meet natural principles that surpass consistence prerequisites.

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Call us today at 1-866-544-5460 or fill out our form online for more information on shredding services available near you, and we will get you several quoted options for free.

Avoid Identity Theft - Hire Shredding Professionals

Identity theft is an extremely scary crime and continues to grow in popularity among thieves. It not only robs its victims their credit information but can rob you of your name. As scary as it is, it is easier to protect yourself than you think - Shred!

All paperwork that has personal information, whether it is personal bank statements or HR specific documents, documents of a certain age or confidentiality level should be shredded. You can choose how often a professional shredding service is needed and can be as little as yearly, or as much as daily shredding. Our service is available, as you need it. Any documents with identifying data, including CDs, zip drives, computer hard drives and more should be properly disposed of. At Mobile Record Shredders we offer electronic document destruction services as well.

The safest, easiest and more often times than not, most affordable way to protect yourself from having your identity stolen, is through shredding your documents. By hiring a confidential shredding company, it can be easy to dispose of the documents identity thieves are looking for when preying on their victims. The task of shredding documents on your own can be cumbersome and time consuming, but hiring a confidential shredding service is a great alternative for both businesses and individuals alike.

Contact us today to help with your shredding needs!

Inactive Company’s Applicant Personal Information Found in Dumpster

"MCALLEN - The local Attorney General’s Office is currently safekeeping personal information that was found in a dumpster.

A viewer notified CHANNEL 5 NEWS he found stacks of folders filled with information of people from the Rio Grande Valley.

David Aguilera Jr. spotted them when he was throwing away posters. He said piles of paper and folders were stacked from the middle to the bottom of the container.

“I was making room to put them in there, and when I moved the box a whole bunch of papers fell and I saw a picture ID of a license,” he said. “I grabbed it and there was another one at the bottom and another one.”

Among the trash were copies of people’s driver’s license and Social Security cards attached to job applications. Most of the paperwork belonged to people out of Brownsville.

Aguilera said the top of the applications listed a company called Millennium Solutions Inc.

CHANNEL 5 NEWS went to visit the address listed on the papers but the building was empty.

However, we later came across a Millennium Solutions Inc.’s social media page. The description said they’re dedicated to selling Time Warner Cable residential services.

Time Warner Cable is now called Charter Spectrum. A spokesperson for the company responded with the following statement:

“The security of personal information is of the outmost importance to us, and we’re looking into the situation.”

We also notified the Texas Attorney General’s Office out of McAllen. They sent an officer to check the dumpster out. The officer wasn’t authorized to do an on-camera interview, but he did say they will have to move the dumpster to a secure location and pick through it by hand to recover all personal information.

Aguilera said he decided to let someone know to save people from the unexpected.

“A lot of my family member’s friends have issues with identity theft. That’s what came to my mind,” he said."

Read the full article here.

Call us today at (719) 544-5460 or fill out the form on the right for more information on shredding services available near you, and we will get you several quoted options for free.

Dangers of Burning Paper

A recent example is a woman in Jefferson Township who was burning paper in her basement. The fire got out of control and the fire department had to put out the blaze.  The initial savings of not calling a certified shredding company ended up costing approximately $1,100 in fire/smoke damages.  Having a fire to destroy information is one of the more popular ideas out there but it's not the best way to avoid identity theft.

The best way to ensure complete, secure destruction of your personal documents is to hire a NAID Certified, bonded, insured company like ours--Mobile Record Shredders.

To learn more about how Mobile Record Shredders can protect your documents and hard drives, please contact us to get a free quote and security risk assessment.

2016 SHRED EVENTS

You don't always need to come to us to have your documents shred. We have a list of upcoming events where we'll be in your neighborhood.

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Shred Event Locations and Times:

Contact us for more information about our shred events. Thanks!

Would you want to be notified of a data breach?

Survey results are in, according to MarketWatch 84% of people want to be notified immediately of a data breach.

A study by ZixCorp focusing on American consumers’ views on data breaches conducted with more than 500 individuals between the ages of 18-75 surveyed, revealed how Americans view data breaches.

“As a whole, the results show that Americans have strong feelings about data breach notification, with 84 percent of those surveyed stating that the best way a company can regain their trust after a breach occurs is to notify them right away and provide a high level of contact. Additionally, 92 percent of respondents think a company should be required to report a data breach to their entire customer base, regardless of breach size.
While the majority of respondents agree on notification, they are divided on what steps should be taken to protect themselves and placing trust in retailers. Specifically, 49 percent of respondents said they have not changed their shopping habits in light of the massive retail breaches over the past two years, and 60 percent trust retailers to protect their credit and debit card information.”

Read the full article and find out more.

Just Another Reason to Shred: Personal Data of 21.5 Million Individuals Stolen in Second OPM Data Breach

PERSONAL DATA BREACH
According to an article posted on FedSmith.com and the NAID News:

"OPM recently discovered two cyber-security incidents that have impacted the data of Federal government employees, contractors, and others:

1. In April 2015, OPM discovered that the personnel data of 4.2 million current and former Federal government employees had been stolen. This means information such as full name, birth date, and other drugs like Imovane 5mg online. This number has not changed since it was announced by OPM in early June and you should have already received a notification if you were impacted.

2. While investigating this incident, in early June 2015, OPM discovered that additional information had been compromised: including background investigation records of current, former, and prospective Federal employees and contractors.

3. OPM and the interagency incident response team have concluded with high confidence that sensitive information, including the Social Security Numbers (SSNs) of 21.5 million individuals, was stolen from the background investigation databases. This includes 19.7 million individuals that applied for a background investigation, and 1.8 million non-applicants, primarily spouses or co-habitants of applicants.Some records also include findings from interviews conducted by background investigators and approximately 1.1 million include fingerprints. Usernames and passwords that background investigation applicants used to fill out their background investigation forms were also stolen.

6. Notifications for this incident have not yet begun.

5. While background investigation records do contain some information regarding mental health and financial history provided by applicants and people contacted during the background investigation, there is no evidence that health, financial, payroll and retirement records of Federal personnel or those who have applied for a Federal job were impacted by this incident (for example, annuity rolls, retirement records, USA JOBS, Employee Express).

For more information about how you can protect yourself, contact us today!

Business Trash is Identity Thief and Corporate Espionage Treasure

What is one person’s trash is another person’s treasure -- Especially when it comes to business “trash” disposal. It is absolutely not wise for any business to simply throw away old documents without proper document destruction. Not only based on the environment impact, but in many cases it’s illegal. Federal and state regulations call for the secure destruction of specific confidential information, including social security numbers, medical records, and industry-specific data, just to name a few. Without the proper disposal of these documents companies can get in a slew of trouble and be severely fined.

In a secure shredding program, like the shredding services that Mobile Record Shredders provides, your company can either bring your documents to our shredding facility, or we provide you with a special locked bin that we pick up and shred in our secure document destruction trucks. The paper is shredded beyond any possible reconstruction and is then recycled.

Contact us with your questions about document destruction, what items you should shred, our recycling program and more. Click on the live chat button to speak with someone now.

Secure shredding services to help you!

Organizations are often in need of shredding services to ensure documents are securely disposed of.

Companies that generally need security for their documents do not have the equipment necessary to ensure documents stay confidential, such as locked consoles to house documents before shredding.

Mobile Record Shredders can come to you -- or you can come to them! We have an option for companies to have on-site locked storage bins for security, so documents remain safe from prying eyes. Our mobile shredding trucks allow for on-site shredding, rather than your documents being transported elsewhere. Leaving only a small trace of your documents that cannot be reassembled. After each project is complete, we leave you with a NAID Certificate of Destruction, to prove your documents have been safely destroyed.

Call us or live chat with one of our representatives to find out how we can help!

Confidential Means Confidential


Companies keep confidential information about their customers and employees in house and out of harms way of identity theft and fraud. When it’s time to dispose of that confidential information, organizations are increasing spending more and more money to address the security of those they have information for.

Organizations are seeing approximately a 15% increase in financing toward confidential document destruction. This not only means companies are understanding the treats that identity theft and fraud pose to their companies, but it also means they are more willing to securely dispose of documents at risk and keep their employee and customer information safe.

At Mobile Record Shredders, we are here to help companies and individuals with their document destruction needs. We have best practices in place to ensure your documents are properly disposed of and out of reach from harm. Our AAA NAID certification ensures of following strict processes and procedures. In order to qualify for this certification, we have gone through rigorous, unannounced audit programs that ensure we are following NAID best practices and keeping security at the highest of standards.

Contact us for more information about how we can keep your confidential information, confidential.