According to press reports, Vance Boelter used sensitive information from public data brokers to locate and murder Minnesota Rep. Melissa Hortman and her husband. Let that sink in.
Without a cent spent, Vance Boelter turned evil into action by visiting sites like peoplefinder.com or one of hundreds of other data brokers, piecing together sensitive information, finding their home addresses, shooting a state senator and his wife and killing an elected representative and her husband. Boelter did not plan to stop there. He left a handwritten “hit list” of 70 other potential targets including Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), and the offices of multiple abortion providers. Each target could be found using data brokers’ information (beenverified.com, ussearch.com, truepeoplesearch.com, and more) to determine phone numbers, addresses, family members, and more. Boelter saw (and circled) many of these sites’ “three days free” advertising pitches as he attempted to find a bargain for his heinous crimes.
Far from an isolated incident, this latest, troubling story speaks to a critical problem: In light of expanding for-profit data collection and selling, how do we protect our families and safeguard our personal data from bad actors? How do we stop the sale of sensitive information when Congress has yet to act? How do we protect ourselves going forward?
There are many Vance Boelters out there. They don’t always look like the typical fraudster, murderer, or lurker. They look like the cute guy you gave your number to, your coworker, your ex, or your stan. None of those individuals, and certainly not strangers, should have the ability to buy or get “three days free” of your sensitive, private information, including where your children live, without your express consent.
That is not the barter that capitalism dreamed of.
Every public figure, every athlete, every sister, every brother, every mother, every individual – must be protected and have a means to protect themselves. And, we must give each of them the ability to remain secure, and private – despite the AI-driven, data-hungry world we now live in and despite the tragic circumstances we continue to find ourselves living in following this weekend’s events.
For too long, national leaders have failed to protect our privacy and safety, allowing organizations—big and small—to recklessly handle and sell our personal data with little to no consequence. We cannot continue to rely on government action that has repeatedly fallen short; instead, we must take matters into our own hands to demand real accountability.
While policies constantly shift and piecemeal, state-by-state regulations offer little real protection, the $434 billion data broker industry continues to thrive, trading our privacy—and our safety—for profit. The consequences of this inaction are clear and dangerous, and it is up to us to stand up, organize, and push for meaningful change, rather than wait for leadership that has consistently let us down.
We must act now, because history has shown that waiting for legislators to do the right thing only leaves us more vulnerable in the interim. And with every new breach, data sale, and tragic story the media covers, American citizens are realizing that this continues to be the case.
There is currently a comprehensive data privacy and security framework under review in Congress that has the ability to flip the script on how we’ve approached privacy to date. Instead of expecting that governments, big tech and other organizations have the security protocols and moral compass in place to protect our data, it reinforces the power of the individual to take control of their data and has the potential to put meaningful, federal legislation in place.
Until this happens, the power to protect private and sensitive data must be in individuals’ hands. This means creating greater transparency about how data is being used, where it exists, and then deleting that personal information from the data brokers that profit from it. It also means permitting the use of identifiers and other protections that we previously requested be included in the federal legislation.
This isn’t just about spam anymore. It’s about the safety of you. If we don’t take action, the consequence will be ours.
