The New Jersey Identity Theft Protection Act (ITPA)

Who is affected by ITPA?

The Act applies to all businesses operating in New Jersey and those maintaining records of personal information of New Jersey residents. The Act requires businesses to “destroy, or arrange the destruction of, a customer’s records within its custody or control containing personal information, which is no longer to be retained… by shredding, erasing, or otherwise modifying the personal information in those records to make it unreadable, undecipherable or non-reconstructable.”

Personal Information is defined as non-public information consisting of an individual’s first name or first initial and last name, in conjunction with one or more of the following:

• A social security number
• A driver’s license number or State identification card number
• A financial account number or credit or debit card number, combined with required access codes or PIN numbers

The Act also requires businesses to disclose any breach of security to any customer whose personal information was, or is reasonably believed to have been, accessed by an unauthorized person. Notification must take place as expediently as possible, without unreasonable delay.

Your Partner in Regulatory Compliance

By purging outdated files or placing one of our locked security consoles in your office, Proshred^® can assist your company in maintaining a document destruction program that meets ITPA regulations. Using state-of-the-art technology, our highly trained and certified security professionals efficiently shred all documents right on your premises. We give you the option to watch the shredding process, and also provide you with a Certificate of Destruction that records each shred. Trust Proshred^® as your partner in compliance for maintaining your document security program.

Ammendments to ITPA

Identity theft is a major challenge to New Jersey law enforcement. Although the public has been warned about the rise in identity theft, there has been no decline in the number of incidents reported. On May 10^th, 2019, new amendments have been made to the definition of personal information. Previously “personal information” was described as an individuals first name or first initial and their last name linked with one or more of the following identifying elements:

• Social Security number;
• Driver’s license number or state-issued identification card number;
• Account number or credit or debit card number, in combination with any required security code, access code, or password that would permit access to an individual's financial account.

Under the new amendments to the act, “personal information” has been expanded to include “user name, email address, or any other account holder identifying information, in combination with any password or security question and answer that would permit access to an online account."