You may remember the ChoicePoint data breach of 2005 - some of us in the biz call this the granddaddy of data breaches. It was the first big one, and it seems like the floodgates opened after that. ChoicePoint is in the credit card payment business, so it houses tons of personal information.

After that, there was the Veterans Administration, various universities, TJ Maxx, and story after story of people's personal information being compromised.

ChoicePoint has finally settled with the federal government and state A.G.s, including AG Nixon. In Missouri, we'll get about $5,000 for consumer education (like this blog). And that's a good result - the most important thing that can come of these data breaches is for consumers to understand the threat and take basic steps to prevent and detect ID theft.