rockwell.HENR801c@Xerox.COM (Ron Rockwell) (02/02/88)
My wife is a corporate lawyer and has access to all sorts of databases. When this Dun & Bradstreet issue came up she did a search for recent articles on the subject and came up with the following: InfoWorld November 23, 1987 p5 InfoWorld December 7, 1987 p5, see letter to editor on p50 InfoWorld December 14, 1987 p6 Newsweek December 28, 1987 p 39 The scoop is that Dun and Bradstreet (D&B) started to offer databases covering financial information and credit records of 750,000 private and public corporations. These databases were marketed through Dialog. Unfortunately (according to D&B) Dialog offered access to these records to anyone who could afford the service and that wasn't D&B's intent. Let me quote from the December 14th issue of InfoWorld about the access issue: "... After examining the facts of the case, in which Dialog users had been denied access to Dun's Financial Records, D&B now intends to enforce its policy ... "... Dun and Bradstreet's credit service provides its subscribers with credit and related financial information for the purpose of making risk- free decisions. To ensure free flow of information [from companies], we have a policy that restricts access to this credit information for certain users ... " ... People and organizations that D&B refuses access to include lawyers, for the purpose of litigation against the companies; government agencies, such as the FBI or IRS, for the purpose of enforcing laws; and labor unions, for the purpose of organization and bargaining ..." The letter to the editor is interesting because it shows that D&B is in trouble with the people that offer it information. Quoting from the letter to the editor: "... Their own information packet states: "The information is furnished only to Dun & Bradstreet subscribers. They must be legitimate businesses." "As the owner of a small private business, I provide confidential information to D&B anually. The information is provided for the legitimate purpose of allowing a supplier, or potential supplier, to judge my creditworthiness. D&B assured businesses that this data cannot and will not be divulged to the public. ..." My wife is currently doing some research on laws/regulations surrounding public/private databases and I hope to have the information soon. Ron Rockwell