School district fears identity theft

The Mountain Home School District has notified its employees that its employee database may have been compromised and that they should be aware of potential identity theft problems.

The school district is not sure at this point if anyone has actually hacked into it's secure files, Supt. Tim McMurtrey said. "We don't know if we were hacked, or someone was dumpster diving, or if it (the problem) comes from somewhere else, outside our system, but we are concerned."

McMurtrey said the school district was changing its security procedures for its secure files, something it had recently bought software to do anyway, in an effort to improve security.

McMurtrey was notified by the Idaho State Police of the potential problem last week after ISP and Jerome County Sheriff's deputies arrested two people in a Twin Falls motel, originally on drug charges.

But in the course of the investigation, which had been triggered after an alert motel clerk noted the apparent use of a forged driver's license, authorities discovered a whole series of allegedly forged or stolen driver's licenses and $17,000 in counterfeit checks.

A number of the drivers licenses were in the names of Caldwell School District employees and several of the checks, which displayed the Caldwell School District logo on them, were apparently meant to be drawn on the Caldwell School District account.

In addition, however, authorities also found a list of Mountain Home School District employees and their Social Security numbers.

At present, there is not evidence to suggest those names or numbers had been used by the suspects, but McMurtrey said he felt it was necessary to notify all the district's employees of the potential for any possible identify theft and lists appropriate steps to take.

The letter urged employees to check their credit ratings and notify at least one of the three major credit reporting bureaus of possible fraud involving their finances. It urges anyone who finds any suspicious activity in their credit reports, or who believes their information may have been misused by someone else, to report that fact to Detective Dan Dack at the Mountain Home Police Department immediately.

The state police are continuing their investigation of the case and McMurtrey promised his staff he would keep them updated as any new information becomes available.