The Price of Stalking? $110

Soon after Mr. Shakes moved to the States, he went out for a long walk. When he came home, he told me he had gone to K-Mart, and that he now knew the price of murder: $302. Two dollars for a hunting permit and three hundred for a rifle. To someone who’d never even seen a gun, no less an entire department for them at the local department store, it was a rather strange discovery.

I had the same reaction when I read this piece by John at AMERICAblog, about websites which, in exchange for $110 will provide a list of every single incoming and outgoing phone call for an entire month for any phone number. John offers a comprehensive list of reasons why this is problematic (Are you an FBI agent with confidential sources? Are you a police officer with confidential sources? etc.), but the most worrying possibility to me is that someone hiding out from a violent stalker—whether an estranged spouse, former girl/boyfriend, or random nutcase—could be so easily (and cheaply) found. The phone numbers of FBI agents, police officers, journalists, elected officials, et al are not so easily come by, which I think makes this a much greater risk to average people, who have a much more difficult time keeping their numbers private.

According to the Chicago Sun-Times, dozens of websites offer this service, and the FBI, the Electronic Privacy Information Center, the Federal Communications Commission, and the Federal Trade Commission have known about this since at least July, but the companies continue to operate without consequence. Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) has called for legislation to criminalize the "stealing and selling" of cell phone logs and urged the Federal Trade Commission to set up a unit to stop it, but nothing’s been done there, either. I suspect it’s not much concern to people who know that their personal numbers aren’t easily located.

With women disproportionately representing the victims of domestic abuse and stalking, this issue clearly should have been addressed at minimum as part of the recently reauthorized Violence Against Women Act. Obviously, I’m concerned about the other potential abuses, but on behalf of the people who, by virtue of their ordinariness, are inimitably more vulnerable, we need to nip this in the bud ASAP.