Davis questions security of Treasury site

Rep. Tom Davis (R-Va.) has asked the Treasury Department to make sure that it can protect personal information collected when people buy savings bonds electronically.Treasury sells bonds online at .“I am concerned about the extent of personal information that is required to be disclosed on the Web site,” Davis said last month in a letter to Van Zeck, Treasury’s commissioner of public debt.Davis noted that the department got a D+ on the 2004 computer security scorecard released last month by his House Government Reform Committee.Although many online financial transactions require credit card numbers, TreasuryDirect asks users to transmit their Social Security numbers, driver’s license numbers, bank routing and account numbers, home addresses, dates of birth and e-mail addresses, in addition to other personal information.Davis also questioned the privacy and security notice, which warns that Treasury cannot guarantee the confidentiality of personal information as it travels across the Internet.