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Parents fume after personal info leak on city site
Parents of the D7 Youth Baseball League are beyond furious after their kids’ personal information got published on the official website of the City of Dearborn Heights. City leaders calling it a terrible mistake.
DEARBORN HEIGHTS, Mich. (FOX 2) - Downriver parents are fuming after they say their children's personal information got leaked on a city government website. They called FOX 2 to get the word out.
Big picture view:
This all centered around the personal information of kids on a Dearborn Heights sports team and the city’s official website.
City officials say it was an error. But parents say that’s not good enough.
Parents of the D7 Youth Baseball League are beyond furious after their children's personal information got published on the official website of the City of Dearborn Heights. City leaders call it a terrible mistake.
William Owen is one of the parents demanding answers, as they worry about that sensitive information falling into the wrong hands.
"It was up for a couple days in a pdf file. Names, birthdates, ages addresses," said Owen. "I have a daughter that’s going through an adoption process. His information was leaked so is the hip family going to come after her now? They know where he lives, where he is at."
What they're saying:
Dearborn Heights officials tell FOX 2 the personal information was listed on documents relating to reimbursements between the City and the youth baseball league. That paperwork went before the City Council to be added as an agenda item.
City Council Chair Mo Baydoun says the documents were not properly redacted as they should have been.
"I saw the D7 Dads Club reimbursement. I said great. I approved it, but I don’t see a back up," said Baydoun. "I review my packet every Saturday Sunday so Saturday morning I wake up, you know - it gets emailed to Thursday. It gets published on the city’s website on Thursday and then on Saturday morning I start reviewing it. Sunday, I do another review and then Tuesday before the meeting, I just do a quick look so I would have not seen it until Saturday, but a resident had saw it and the resident informed reached out to the clerk and said this needs to be removed in the clerk acted extremely fast."
Others in government are calling it a clerical error. But the parents say that’s not nearly enough.
DH Mayor Bill Bazzi tells me by phone everyone screwed up. He wrote to the sports league, apologizing and said he’s working to see how the process can be fixed.
What's next:
Council members say there needs to be a policy that redacts personal information in certain cases.
The parents say they will continue to press for more answers and change.